Battery Management: Chargers, Controllers, Switching Solution ICs

Our Li-ion charge management controllers are reliable, low-cost and high accuracy voltage regulation solutions that require few external components to reduce design size, cost and complexity.

Combine one of our high-speed and high-voltage MCP1631HV Pulse-Width Modulators (PWMs) with one of our microcontrollers (MCUs) to implement programmable switch-mode charging for Li-Ion and NiMH batteries and other battery chemistries.

The MCP19111 is a mid-voltage analog-based PWM controller with an integrated 8-bit PIC® MCU that can be programmed to make a very flexible battery charger by controlling a high-efficiency synchronous buck circuit. The MCP19111 is ideal for charging multiple battery cells.

This family of small-form-factor 8-bit PIC^® MCUs enables cost-effective battery management for portable devices.

Key Features:

• 14-pin packages as small as 3 × 3 mm
• 5.5 MHz op amp with built-in resistor ladder significantly reduces BOM cost and application footprint
• 12-bit Analog-to-Digital Converter with Computation (ADCC), buffered Digital-to-Analog Converter (DAC), high-speed comparator and other Core Independent Peripherals to simplify your design while reducing power consumption
• Rapid prototyping with our development tools including MPLAB^® Code Configurator and MPLAB Mindi™ Analog Simulator

Based on the low-power AVR^® core, this 8-bit MCU gives you the features and freedom to create battery management solutions.

Key Features

• Up to three configurable op amps and a 12-bit differential ADC to perform differential analog-to-digital measurement for your low-side current
• Three high-speed comparators
• 10-bit DAC with output buffer
• 16-bit center-aligned Pulse-Width Modulation (PWM) generation with 12-bit complementary output
• Multi-voltage I/O to eliminate the need for a level shifter

Battery Chemistries, Terminology, Profiles and Charging Topologies for Real-World Products

This class will introduce you to standard charge profiles for several common battery chemistries including Li-Ion, LiFePO4, NiMH and Lead Acid. We will then reference a number of real-world products and discuss their charging and battery requirements. 

Introduction to Battery Pack Design

This class is designed for hardware and firmware engineers who are moving beyond simple single-cell battery products and into multi-cell designs. This may be because you need high peak power, high voltage, or longer run times in your application. 

This class will help you understand how to deal with the dynamic impedance of solar cells, apply power-point tracking algorithms, sizing your battery and solar array, and negotiating between tracking efficiency vs. the charge waveform required by your battery chemistry.

Provides design suggestions for common circuit needs, estimates performance for common modifications, and can export to MPLAB^® Mindi™ Analog Simulator for verification.

Uses a SIMetrix/SIMPLIS environment to model circuit behavior, reducing design time with software debugging for initial design verification.

Provides advice on your exact physical circuit layout, sharing best practices from an experienced power supply designer, so that physical hardware will match simulations.