Optical modeling of bullet-shaped LED for use in self-luminous traffic signs

Bullet-shaped LEDs are commonly used in self-luminous traffic signs as LED-dotted matrices due to their low cost, simplicity, robustness, and ease of installation. We proposed a simple low-cost method that creates a model suitable for the high manufacturing tolerance found in bullet-shaped LEDs. The method starts from measuring multiple one-dimensional angular intensity patterns at interested distances from multiple LEDs to form a database, including distances at 10, 15, 20, 25, 35, 50, and 100 mm. Their normalized cross-correlations are then calculated to find the batch that has the most similarity and base our model off that batch. Finally, we validate the model via Monte Carlo simulations in comparison to the original one-dimensional angular intensity patterns in the database. The platform demonstrated to obtain an average of 99% in normalized cross correlation between different batches of the same model LED, and a model of that LED is currently under development.