Mikroelektronika d.o.o.
Balancer 2 Click Board
Balancer 2 Click Board
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Overview
The Balancer 2 Click Board™ is an overvoltage protection device for a 2-series cell lithium-ion battery. Click contains two separate overvoltage battery detection circuits and automatic cell imbalance correction. It can be used for various applications, power tools, portable equipment, and instrumentation, to energy storage systems (ESS), while providing the output voltage at the same time. By utilizing an externally connected power supply, it can charge 2-cell Li-Ion batteries.
The Balancer 2 Click Board™ is supported by the mikroSDK compliant library, which includes functions that simplify software development. The Click Board™ comes as a fully tested product, ready to be used on a system equipped with mikroBUS™.
How Does The Balancer 2 Click Board™ Work?
The Balancer 2 Click Board™ has two separate voltage battery monitoring circuits, overvoltage supply detection, and automatic cell balancing. The Balancer 2 Click Board™ monitors the voltages on each battery and correct voltage difference. Combined with a LiPo/Li-Ion battery charger, this Click board™ can be used in a wide range of applications that can benefit from reliable and efficient battery charging circuit.
The Balancer 2 Click Board™ is designed to balance two LiPo/Li-Ion batteries, wired in serial. It contains all needed an analog circuitry, made of two separate blocks, for each battery, which is needed for the described device. Each block consists of one MOSFET, used as a power transistor - Si7858BDP, from Vishay Siliconix. Besides the MOSFET, the circuit also contains transistor needed for automatic gate bias regulation, based on the current running through the shunt resistors (R7 and R17). Each output is also optocoupled, in order to ensure very good reliability of the Click board™, regardless of the external power supply used. For that, EL357N-G photocouplers were used, from Everlight.
Two circuit blocks described above, combined, make the battery cell balancer. Besides that, this Click board™ has protection for the supply voltage. if the supply voltage is higher then 8.4V, the main P-Mosfet is power off and safe battery.
The third part of the Balancer 2 Click Board™ is voltage monitoring circuitry, which is based on the MCP3202, Dual Channel 12-Bit A/D Converter with SPI Serial Interface, from Microchip. The cell voltages are brought to the ADC input, through the dedicated voltage dividers, serving to conditionate the voltage signal levels to ADC inputs. That way direct output voltage is achieved, so the user can switch the cell independently based on the voltage parameters read.
The voltage level of the logic section can be selected via VCC SEL jumper, between 3.3V and 5V. This allows for both 3.3V and 5V capable MCUs to use the SPI communication lines properly.
SPECIFICATIONS
| Type | Battery charger |
| Applications | The Balancer 2 Click Board™ can be used for voltage monitor, power tools, battery balancing, portable equipment and instrumentation, to energy storage systems (ESS) |
| On-board modules | MCP3202, Dual Channel 12-Bit A/D Converter with SPI Serial Interface, from Microchip. |
| Key Features | Over-voltage protection, optocoupled outputs, independent cell voltage readings |
| Interface | GPIO,SPI |
| Compatibility | mikroBUS |
| Click board size | L (57.15 x 25.4 mm) |
| Input Voltage | 3.3V or 5V |
PINOUT DIAGRAM
This table shows how the pinout on thye Balancer 2 Click Board™ corresponds to the pinout on the mikroBUS™ socket (the latter shown in the two middle columns).
| Notes | Pin |  |
Pin | Notes | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cell 1 | CL1 | 1 | AN | PWM | 16 | CL2 | Cell 2 |
| Supply | SUP | 2 | RST | INT | 15 | ST | Status |
| SPI Chip Select | CS | 3 | CS | RX | 14 | NC | |
| SPI Clock | SCK | 4 | SCK | TX | 13 | NC | |
| SPI Data OUT | SDO | 5 | MISO | SCL | 12 | NC | |
| SPI Data IN | SDI | 6 | MOSI | SDA | 11 | NC | |
| Power Supply | 3.3V | 7 | 3.3V | 5V | 10 | 5V | Power Supply |
| Ground | GND | 8 | GND | GND | 9 | GND | Ground |
ONBOARD SETTINGS AND INDICATORS
| Label | Name | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| LD1 | STAT | - | Status LED indicator |
| VCC SEL | - | Left | Logic voltage level selection: left position 3.3V, right position 5V |
| LD2 | PWR | - | Power LED indicator |
BALANCER 2 CLICK ELECTRICAL SPECIFICATIONS
| Description | Min | Typ | Max | Unit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Battery balancing current | - | 250 | - | mA |
| Overvoltage Protection accuracy | - | 20 | - | mV |
| Input Voltage supply | - | 8.4 | - | V |
| Input Current supply | - | 400 | - | mA |
Software Support
We provide a library for the Balancer 2 Click Board™ on our LibStock page, as well as a demo application (example), developed using MikroElektronika compilers. The demo can run on all the main MikroElektronika development boards.
Library Description
Library provides control over device pins and SPI comuncation. You can read battery capacity level and it provides functions for generic spi transfer function.
Key Functions
void balancer2_generic_transfer ( uint8_t *tx_buf, uint8_t *rx_buf, uint8_t buf_len )- Generic function for SPI communicationfloat balancer2_get_batttery_lvl ( uint8_t bat_num )- Get specific battery capcitive lvluint16_t balancer2_read_adc ( uint8_t cmd_byte )- Read ADC value from SPI
Example Description
The application is composed of three sections :
- System Initialization - Initialization of SPI module and additional pins
- Application Initialization - Sets reference volatage of device, s ets pins for supply and cells to high
- Application Task - Every 2 seconds logs readings of battery mV lvl
void application_task ( )
{
float battery;
char demo_str[ 30 ];
battery = balancer2_get_batttery_lvl( BALANCER2_BATT1 );
FloatToStr( battery, demo_str );
mikrobus_logWrite( "Battery 1 : ", _LOG_TEXT );
mikrobus_logWrite( demo_str, _LOG_TEXT );
mikrobus_logWrite( " mV", _LOG_LINE );
battery = balancer2_get_batttery_lvl( BALANCER2_BATT2 );
FloatToStr( battery, demo_str );
mikrobus_logWrite( "Battery 2 : ", _LOG_TEXT );
mikrobus_logWrite( demo_str, _LOG_TEXT );
mikrobus_logWrite( " mV", _LOG_LINE );
battery = balancer2_get_batttery_lvl( BALANCER2_BATT_BOTH );
FloatToStr( battery, demo_str );
mikrobus_logWrite( "Batteries : ", _LOG_TEXT );
mikrobus_logWrite( demo_str, _LOG_TEXT );
mikrobus_logWrite( " mV", _LOG_LINE );
mikrobus_logWrite( "__________________________________________", _LOG_LINE );
Delay_ms( 2000 );
}
The full application code, and ready to use projects can be found on our LibStock page.
Other mikroE Libraries used in the example:
- SPI
- UART
- Conversions
Additional Notes and Information
Depending on the development board you are using, you may need a USB UART click, USB UART 2 click or RS232 click to connect to your PC, for development systems with no UART to USB interface available on the board. The terminal available in all MikroElektronika compilers, or any other terminal application of your choice, can be used to read the message.
MIKROSDK
The Balancer 2 Click Board™ is supported with mikroSDK - MikroElektronika Software Development Kit. To ensure proper operation of mikroSDK compliant Click board™ demo applications, mikroSDK should be downloaded from the LibStock and installed for the compiler you are using.
Software Support
We provide a library for the Balancer 2 Click Board™ on our LibStock page, as well as a demo application (example), developed using MikroElektronika compilers. The demo can run on all the main MikroElektronika development boards.
Library Description
Library provides control over device pins and SPI comuncation. You can read battery capacity level and it provides functions for generic spi transfer function.
Key Functions
void balancer2_generic_transfer ( uint8_t *tx_buf, uint8_t *rx_buf, uint8_t buf_len )- Generic function for SPI communicationfloat balancer2_get_batttery_lvl ( uint8_t bat_num )- Get specific battery capcitive lvluint16_t balancer2_read_adc ( uint8_t cmd_byte )- Read ADC value from SPI
Example Description
The application is composed of three sections :
- System Initialization - Initialization of SPI module and additional pins
- Application Initialization - Sets reference volatage of device, s ets pins for supply and cells to high
- Application Task - Every 2 seconds logs readings of battery mV lvl
void application_task ( )
{
float battery;
char demo_str[ 30 ];
battery = balancer2_get_batttery_lvl( BALANCER2_BATT1 );
FloatToStr( battery, demo_str );
mikrobus_logWrite( "Battery 1 : ", _LOG_TEXT );
mikrobus_logWrite( demo_str, _LOG_TEXT );
mikrobus_logWrite( " mV", _LOG_LINE );
battery = balancer2_get_batttery_lvl( BALANCER2_BATT2 );
FloatToStr( battery, demo_str );
mikrobus_logWrite( "Battery 2 : ", _LOG_TEXT );
mikrobus_logWrite( demo_str, _LOG_TEXT );
mikrobus_logWrite( " mV", _LOG_LINE );
battery = balancer2_get_batttery_lvl( BALANCER2_BATT_BOTH );
FloatToStr( battery, demo_str );
mikrobus_logWrite( "Batteries : ", _LOG_TEXT );
mikrobus_logWrite( demo_str, _LOG_TEXT );
mikrobus_logWrite( " mV", _LOG_LINE );
mikrobus_logWrite( "__________________________________________", _LOG_LINE );
Delay_ms( 2000 );
}
The full application code, and ready to use projects can be found on our LibStock page.
Other mikroE Libraries used in the example:
- SPI
- UART
- Conversions
Additional Notes and Information
Depending on the development board you are using, you may need a USB UART click, USB UART 2 click or RS232 click to connect to your PC, for development systems with no UART to USB interface available on the board. The terminal available in all MikroElektronika compilers, or any other terminal application of your choice, can be used to read the message.
MIKROSDK
The Balancer 2 Click Board™ is supported with mikroSDK - MikroElektronika Software Development Kit. To ensure proper operation of mikroSDK compliant Click board™ demo applications, mikroSDK should be downloaded from the LibStock and installed for the compiler you are using.
Frequently Asked Questions
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