Automotive Engineering - December 2023 - BET-20

Battery Testing
this lower energy bills, but it also enables
manufacturers to meet green initiatives. A
regenerative power supply usually pays for
itself via energy savings in a few years,
unlike a linear load that uses resistors to
convert electricity into waste heat.
Failure to Use a Modular Design
It may seem fine to mix and match
brands of equipment, but engineers must
consider balancing outputs and loads
across the power supplies. If one regenerative
power supply fails, then the other
power supplies in series should pick up
the output/load and share it equally or
all should stop in order not to overload
any single power supply.
Some power supply manufacturers design
each power supply to use a shared
bus so units in a rack can communicate
with each other and share resources
equally. The control software needs to
notice if the remaining power supplies
are overtaxed. For example, say the operator
is discharging a battery at 100 A
using two 50 A loads. If one of the loads
fails, then the remaining electronic load
is absorbing 100 A, and it may not be
rated for that. The software should notice
the problem and shut down the test system
to prevent damage.
One advantage of a modular design is
reliability. If one electronic load or power
supply fails, battery testing does not need
to stop until a replacement unit arrives.
Instead,
the remaining equipment can
continue operation at a lower power rating.
Many manufacturers may also keep an
extra unit on site to switch out any failed
power supply immediately. This avoids the
need to wait for a service tech to arrive or
units to be returned from repair.
Not Considering Space
Requirements
A final consideration is power density.
Production floor space is precious. As
battery power
capacity increases, the
number of test racks increases. If the
space is unavailable on the plant floor,
the company faces the costly prospect of
rearranging the production line. Even in a
test lab, space is limited. Exits should be
easy to access in case of an emergency.
Engineers should strive for the fewest
number of racks needed to accomplish
the testing.
Here is another advantage of the modular
systems mentioned above. Modular
systems have the ability to easily accept
power supplies as power and current requirements
grow, as long as max voltages
stay the same, saving costs.
Avoiding integration pitfalls will help
manufacturers test batteries safely and
get the most out of their investment in
test equipment.
This article was written by Russ Gaubatz,
Senior Applications Engineer, EA ElektroAutomatik
(Novi, MI). For more information,
visit www.eapowered.com. 
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Battery & Electrification Technology, December 2023
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Automotive Engineering - December 2023

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