A Modular Battery Management System for Electric Vehicles

In electric vehicles the energy storage provided by the batteries is of utmost importance: it provides autonomy to the vehicle. However rechargeable batteries cannot operate alone, a Battery Management System is needed to provide safe operation conditions, monitor its state and balance its charge. In this article a Battery Management System is developed for applications in electric vehicles and autonomous robotics. We design the system in a modular way to give flexibility and allow portability to different type of battery packs. Low-cost microcontrollers were used for the system providing also communication with the vechicle's on-board computer. A passive balancing schemed is chosen as a way of battery balancing. The proposed system was tested using a battery pack demonstrating its balancing capabilities.