SDG Electronics

Switching LED driver

Buck or boost LED-string drive, sense resistance, dimming averages and output-ripple screening.

Development preview. Check the assumptions below before relying on a result. Calculations run in your browser.

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How it calculates

Assumptions

  • Analog dimming scales the sense reference; PWM dimming scales average output and resistor heat without changing the on-pulse operating point.
  • LED current ripple applies a first-order current-divider response at the switching frequency to the power-stage ripple envelope. It is not an exact peak-to-peak waveform reconstruction.
  • At very low analog duty, discontinuous switching and minimum on-time behavior may dominate.

Worked example

These are the calculator's default inputs. Change any input above to recalculate.

Inputs

Topology
buck
Input voltage
24 V
Each LED forward voltage
3 V
Series LED count
5
Full-scale LED current
0.35 A
Sense reference voltage
0.1 V
Analog dimming fraction
1
PWM dimming duty
1
Switching frequency
500000 Hz
Inductance
0.0001 H
Each LED differential resistance
0.5 Ω
Effective output capacitance
0.000001 F
Open-string OVP threshold
20 V
OVP reference voltage
1.2 V
OVP lower-divider resistor
10000 Ω

Results

Current-sense resistor
0.285714 Ω
Average LED current
0.35 A
LED string voltage
15 V
Sense resistor average power
0.035 W
Ideal switch duty
0.629167
Power-stage conduction
CCM
Inductor peak current
0.405996 A
Switching-ripple LED-current estimate
0.012714 A

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