Maintaining Battery Safety And Life Of Battery Are Top Priorities In Battery Charger Design

Focus:

Various rechargeable battery chemistries have been developed over the years including sealed lead acid (SLA), NiCd, NiMH, Li-ion, Li-ion polymer and lithium iron phosphate (LFP or LiFePO4). The different chemistries have their advantages and disadvantages, but all have safety issues related to charging. This article discusses the risks to battery safety and long operating life posed by charging errors, and describes the techniques used in charger design to prevent these errors. It also identifies some governing standards such as UL 1236 and DoE rules. This information may be of value to those designing battery chargers as well as those specifying/purchasing them. This discussion focuses on charging of the SLA and LFP batteries, but these issues generally apply to the other chemistries too. In addition to some battery history, topics covered include protection against reverse battery polarity using circuit breaker, fuse or relay, and polarized connectors; temperature limits for charging; the constant-current constant-voltage charging algorithm and end-of-charge limits; and why SLA and LFP don’t tolerate overcharging.

What you’ll learn:

• How to protect batteries against charging errors such as reversed battery connections, unsafe charging temperatures, and exceeding end-of-charge limits
• How to understand what industry standards govern design of battery chargers

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Author & Publication:

Kevin Parmenter, Chair, and James Spangler, Co-chair, PSMA Safety and Compliance Committee , How2Power Today, Nov 15 2019

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