The LTC3305 lead acid battery balancer is currently the only active lead-acid balancer that enables individual batteries in a series-connected stack to be balanced to each other.
Why is battery balancing important?
Battery balancing is crucial in various applications that use multi-cell battery packs: Electric vehicles (EVs): Battery balancing ensures optimal EV battery packs' performance, range, and longevity. Renewable energy storage: Large-scale battery systems for solar and wind energy storage benefit from efficient balancing.
The control circuitry is complex and a discrete implementation is large and costly. The LTC3305 lead acid battery balancer is currently the only active lead-acid balancer that enables individual batteries in a series-connected stack to be balanced to each other.
How do lead acid batteries self-balance?
Traditionally, lead acid batteries have been able to "self-balance" using a combination of appropriate absorption charge setpoints with periodic equalization maintenance charging. This characteristic of lead acid batteries is enabled by a secondary electrolysis (hydrogen producing) reaction within the electrolyte of the batteries.
In all the examples, two or more lead-acid batteries are connected in series. When a single lead-acid battery in the stack fails, all the lead-acid batteries in the series stack need to be replaced to maintain battery stack performance. This is a considerable expense.
An efficient battery balancing solution requires a switch network that can be used to move charge from one battery to another to achieve a balanced battery stack. The control circuitry is complex and a discrete implementation is large and costly.
How do lead acid batteries work?
This characteristic of lead acid batteries is enabled by a secondary electrolysis (hydrogen producing) reaction within the electrolyte of the batteries. The produced hydrogen gas either vents (for flooded batteries) or is recombined into the electrolyte (for OPzV Gel and AGM batteries), expelling energy.