Automotive Engineering - June 2022 - 5

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EXPERT Insight
Keysight Technologies offers efficiency and scalability with latest
EV battery-test systems
As electric vehicles (EVs) become more and more popular, EV batteries become more and more important. Testing these batteries
to assure reliability and extended life is a critical step for all EVs. For this Expert Insight interview, SAE's Automotive Engineering
spoke with Keysight Technologies' Jim Duffy, Business Development Manager for electric vehicle powertrain test solutions and
Steve Mango, automotive market industry manager, about the rapidly-evolving demands of EV battery testing and how Keysight's
strategy for test systems optimizes scalability and investment cost.
Automotive Engineering: Steve, can you explain
how Keysight's history and its acquisition
of Scienlab fit into shaping the company's
current strategy for battery-test solutions
customized for each customer?
Steve Mango: Keysight has a long, rich and proud
legacy dating back to 1938 when Bill Hewlett and
Dave Packard started a little test business in a
small garage in Palo Alto, California. That company
grew to be Hewlett Packard, or HP. Fastforward
from the 1930s to the 1990s, when HP
spun off the test-and-measurement area in 1999
to create Agilent Technologies. We continued to
work under the Agilent umbrella until 2014, when
it was decided to split into two companies.
Keysight Technologies continues to focus on
electronic test and measurement.
Part of our EV and battery test business included
the acquisition of Scienlab in 2017.
Scienlab is in Bochum, Germany and is focused
on high-power, grid and machine emulation, EV
charging interoperability and battery cell, module
and pack testing.
So Keysight can provide a comprehensive
portfolio of current turnkey test solutions relating
to the entire EV ecosystem, which we break into the following
areas: the first is grid power - everything from the power
on the grid up to and including the EV supply equipment or
charging station. The second piece is battery power, whether
that be in R&D, manufacturing or even final testing. And the
last piece is EV power, ensuring the EV battery supplies efficient
power to the road where it counts.
Automotive Engineering: What are Keysight's different approaches
for addressing the needs of battery testing for
R&D, manufacturing and cell, module and pack applications?
Jim Duffy: Keysight has comprehensive test solutions when it
comes to battery test, and it doesn't matter where you are; you
could be experimenting with chemistry and R&D before you
actually form a cell, to now that you have a cell, testing at that
level, the module level and the pack level. We also, have a very
good lithium-ion self-discharge measurement capability.
Lithium-ion cells and batteries have a very long shelf life. So,
how do you measure that accurately and do it very quickly? We
have an instrument that can do that within an hour and test 32
channels simultaneously with the one instrument. If you have
multiple instruments, of course, then you can test a lot of cells
at the same time.
AUTOMOTIVE ENGINEERING
Jim Duffy
Automotive Engineering: What are the most
prominent challenges for engineering groups
currently doing battery testing?
Jim Duffy: There are issues with operating costs
as power levels continue to go up. We're going
through these charge-and-discharge cycles
even at cell formation until a cell is formed;
we're going through charge-and-discharge cycles
all the way up through and including packlevel
testing. So keeping down the costs of that
energy is important, because on the discharge
cycle, normally you'd waste that energy in heat
- not only are you wasting electricity, but
you're also dealing with getting rid of a substantial
amount of heat, which, for example,
can tax HVAC systems in your facility.
To address this, all of our systems are regenSteve
Mango
erative. When we're on the discharge cycle,
we're converting that energy from DC back to
clean, three-phase AC that we can loop back to
the charging side - and we're 95% efficient in
doing that. You only have to deal with the dissipation
of 5% of the energy and heat. That's a
lot of cost savings on your electric bill and
keeping operating costs at a minimum. And as
these power levels continue to go up, safety also is very important
and we have comprehensive safety solutions that, standalone,
are very comprehensive - but also, we can integrate
very well with the customer's existing safety systems.
Automotive Engineering: It seems that pack level testing in
particular is becoming increasingly important. So, why is your
new SL1700A pack-level battery test system important in this
specific area of testing and to whom are you targeting it?
Jim Duffy: The new 1700 Series is based on silicon carbide [SiC]
technology. That reduces the footprint - that's very important.
It's operating in over 95% efficiency on the regeneration side.
Also, the capital investment is kept at a reasonable level; as your
requirements expand and as you grow. For example, you could
initially buy a tester that's rated at 90 kW. As your needs increase,
you can move up to 120, 180 all the way up to 270 kW testing
capability, and the real estate has not changed. That's what we've
built into the platform, a lot of flexibility and scalability. You don't
have to be concerned about the need for more real estate.
Watch the full interview with Jim & Steve.
June 2022 5

Automotive Engineering - June 2022

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