PoF-Simulation-Assisted Reliability Prediction for Electrolytic Capacitor in LED Drivers

The temperature of electrolytic capacitor in light-emitting diode (LED) drivers continuously increases under operation conditions, thus the capacitors degrade faster than that with constant temperature assumption. In this paper, a physics-of-failure (PoF)-based reliability prediction methodology is developed for LED drivers to consider the temperature change of electrolytic capacitor. SPICE simulation, compact thermal modeling, and Monte Carlo simulation are integrated to predict the failure rate distribution of an electrolytic capacitor of given LED driver systems. The simulation results agree well with the accelerated test results for an RC linear AC-DC converter. Furthermore, a single inductor buck-boost DC-DC converter is simulated to understand the degradation behavior of electrolytic capacitor. It has been found that the temperature of an output stage capacitor increases significantly during operation time. The capacitor's performance without taking temperature change into account results in an overestimated driver lifetime by more than 38% for the selected case study.