Other Parts Discussed in Thread: BQ76920,
I have a customer trying to use the BQ4050. Their prototype design rev1 has mistakes, so must be redone anyway. However, they have a mechanical issue where they need to eliminate one of the four high-current terminals from their PCB. Just to be clear, their request was to move the sense resistor to the high-side, so that the Pack - and B- grounds become the same. This was to eliminate needing the separate B- terminal. From lots of reading, I believe this design change would not be practical; requiring many op-amp circuits and a negative supply, etc. However, I see that the BQ76920 does eliminate the need for the forth terminal by moving the protection FETs to the low side. I could switch to that, but the customer's techs are already very familiar with the BQ4050 settings. While TI does not have a reference design or app note for it, can I simply have the BQ4050 drive FETs on the low-side? I would adapt a design from the BQ76920 reference schematic. Or am I missing an internal detail to the BQ4050 that makes this impossible?
