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Need help finding the best battery management solution for my application

Other Parts Discussed in Thread: BQ40Z60, BQ76920, BQ78350

Hi all,

I am designing a product that will be powered off of a small (~60 W) ~12 V DC adapter. This product will also contain a 3s Li-ion battery. Many parts of this product will be low power and can run continuously off the adapter. But there will also be low duty cycle high power consumers, like motors, that will require up to 60 W on their own. In this case I hope to supplement power from a high discharge Li-ion battery. When these low duty cycle portions are off, the battery would be slowly charged by the adapter. I have spent some time looking for good solutions for a complete battery management, protection, and charge solution. There are so many options, and it is a little overwhelming to determine which product(s) are best suited for my application. 

I have looked at the bq40z60 and it looks promising, but I also see a lot of documents mentioning the bq76920 + bq78350 + (some charger). What is the advantages and disadvantages of these two systems? Are there other solutions that are common that I have missed?

I also know that I will need some sort of power path solution whether I just implement some ideal diodes or find a solution that lets me supplement the system power like I want automatically.

Thank you in advance for any guidance or clarification you can give.

Chris Jones   

  • Hi Chris,

    Thank you for your interest in TI BMS. I am part of the monitoring and protection organization which is where you originally posted your question, and this new thread is the gauging forum. While these forums are designed for the technical support, we can certainly provide some basic information on the various solution options when it comes to a BMS system. Obviously as you have experienced already that designing any BMS system of any level the task is quite daunting. Hence, this should hint as to why the BMS business is very diverse with many options to take. I will only mention that both solutions you have mentioned above are perfectly doable solutions, and whether they are the best is a very arguable question to answer as they will depend on your key requirements. What i want to really leave you with is approach this problem from what you want to accomplish and realize that cost, complexiity, accuracy, protection, integration, etc are all important factors to consider and you will need to compromise as a truly "best solution" never exists it will be based on the application you are doing and its behavior.

    I would recommend, starting with some featured products you can find the various portal pages in our website, and work with those and see how complex it becomes.

    Miguel