On Tue, 17 Apr 2018 14:33:41 +0100, "Brian Gaff"
wrote:

Its a shame these devices do not have a thermal mounting point to enable the
metal case to cool it.

Agreed Brian but they probably don't (yet anyway) because the
designers consider it unnecessary?

The thing is I've not read anything about how (thermally) restrictive
an enclosure you can put such things in but am trying to use common
sense / experience to not make it worse than it need be.

I think from experience matt black paint does insulate but can also get hot
in itself.

Yes, if you had two sheets of ally and pained one matt black and left
one polished silver, I'm guessing the matt black one would get hotter
if you shone an incandescent spotlight equally across both. I'm not
sure there would be any difference if you blew a fan heater across
both or touched both with a clothes iron, so it's only radiated (not
convected or conducted heat).

To be of any use it needs to be part of the material and share
its thermal qualities.

I agree, that would be the best solution but conscious it may be
overkill in this situation (even as part of just experimenting etc).

Cheers, T i m