Thermal Modeling and Management of the Integrated HID Ballast

High power density electronic ballast is desired for the High Intensity Discharge (HID) lamps in order to fully utilize the space inside the lamp fixture and reduce the overall size. However, by installing the ballast inside the lamp fixture, the ambient temperature for the ballast will be higher, and combined with the reduced size, the thermal condition for the integrated ballast will be much harsher. Therefore the detail thermal analysis and proper management is a must for the high power density ballast design. In this paper, a thermal simulation model of the integrated ballast is developed with experimental calibration, with which the thermal performance of the ballast within a plastic fixture is studied. The thermal management methods to reduce the peak temperature are also investigated and discussed based on the model. Experiments results verified the validity of the proposed model and thermal management approaches.