Utilizing UV LEDs in Manufacturing
The UV-LED market is a relatively small segment of the overall LED market. It is estimated roughly to be $30 million annually, whereas, the overall LED market is already in the multibillion dollar range. The UV-LED market is expected to grow by 30% annually to about $100 million in 2016. This late surge is due to breakthroughs in radiant power and intensity of UV-LED that will enable the displacement of mercury-vapor lamps altogether in the future. This could be due in part to recent achievements in product flux density of UV-LED chips beyond the flux density of 4W/cm2 at different wavelengths.
In manufacturing applications, the spectral ranges that are often used reside in the UV-A (315-400nm) and UV-B (280-315nm) range. Actually, 90% of the UV LED applications are based on these two ranges. The UV-A range is used in applications such as curing of adhesives, coatings and inks. Meanwhile, the UV-B range is often used for applications such as visual inspection systems on machine vision, and detecting. And, at the lower end, the UV-C spectral range (100-280nm) is primarily used for air and water sterilization.
Since the curing process for manufacturing applications requires large and high-powered LEDs, it is often optimal to use LEDs in the range of 385, 395 and 405 nm. These ranges are preferred due to the ability to drive the LEDs at higher power with better efficiency.
Key UV LED Features & Benefits:
- Longer Life, >50,000 hours
- Stable power output throughout the life of the LED
- Instant on/off
- Emits no heat, able to cure heat-sensitive substrates
- Non-hazardous, contains no mercury
- Consumes less power
- Slower degradation when compared to conventional arc lamps
- No shutters needed
- No costly replacement parts required, greatly limits machine downtime
- Cost savings over product lifetime
To date, the migration from vapor lamps to UV LED is somewhat slow. Some contributing factors are life expectancy and efficiency. Typical UV LED life expectancy is about 2,000 hours to 5,000 hours compared to vapor lamps at 8,000 hours to 12,000 hours. But, recent advancement in the next generations of UV-LED has a life expectancy of 50,000 hours or 10 times that of the average UV LEDs. Meanwhile, the typical efficiency of UV LED is about 5% to 8%, which requires further development enhancements. Regardless, the UV LED adoption will grow as the gap narrows between UV-LEDs and vapor lamps. This will translate into a faster growing market in the future.
Reference:
http://www.ecnmag.com/articles/2010/04/key-benefits-next-gen-uv-led-tech
