Background

Phoenix Broadband has recently provided capability for our line of outside-plant power supply transponders to work in conjunction with the battery sensors used in our inside-plant Battery Monitoring System. Each sensor is an intelligent unit that measures its battery’s voltage, post temperature, and internal admittance (the inverse of impedance). This exciting development represents a breakthrough in OSP power supply battery monitoring, and provides non-intrusive, predictive test information about each battery's state-of-health. Using a new patent-applied-for software algorithm, Phoenix Broadband has now provided the battery sensors with the capability to intelligently manage the float-charge voltage of its associated battery.

Battery Balancing – The Benefits

Each of the batteries within a string of batteries is slightly different, even when they are brand new. These minor differences cause each of the batteries within a string to charge up to a different voltage than its peers. The charger unit, which is connected across the whole string, has no knowledge of what the state-of-charge of individual batteries is. Consequently, it has no way to affect their individual state-of charge. The more batteries that are charged in series, the harder it becomes to match them and maintain uniform charge levels. Therefore, there is a high probability that one or more batteries will remain undercharged or overcharged despite the fact that the string voltage is correct. It is widely accepted that batteries, when left in an overcharged or undercharged state for long periods of time, begin to sulphate, which leads to premature loss of capacity and early failure. This especially true of batteries that are subjected to the extreme temperatures of the outdoor environment.

Battery balancing systems are well known for their ability to extend the life of batteries. Traditional balancing units are devices which connect to the individual batteries within a string and manage their state-of-charge by removing charge from overcharged batteries and putting it into the undercharged batteries. These devices typically have little or no intelligence, and provide no remote monitoring information about how hard they’re working to keep the string balanced.

Intelligent Battery Balancing from Phoenix Broadband

Intelligent battery balancing is a patent-applied-for by-product of Phoenix Broadband’s intelligent digital sensor technology. The process takes advantage of each sensor’s ability to produce a digitally programmable current in a battery while simultaneously monitoring the battery’s voltage. Here’s how it works: 

The power supply transponder is the “brains” of the charge-balancing process. The transponder, by virtue of its knowledge of the terminal voltage of each battery in the string, makes a determination that a battery-to-battery voltage difference exists which exceeds a user-defined threshold. The transponder computes the “mean” of the battery voltages within the string. Once the mean is determined, the transponder preloads each of the sensors within the string with information that the sensors will use to autonomously control a balancing process, until the transponder checks them again. Typically, the transponder checks each sensor every 2-10 seconds.

Numerous safeguards are built in to prevent undesirable loss of control, including fixed and programmable minimum voltage limits, fixed and programmable maximum working times, and fixed and programmable current limits.

The transponder monitors and manages the balancing process, and so it knows how hard each sensor is working to keep its associated battery balanced. There are user-defined alarm thresholds which can be specified so that the transponder will automatically send an SNMP alarm trap if any battery’s charge is getting out of control.

Intelligent Charging – Summary

Intelligent battery balancing and charging is a revolutionary new concept in battery management, and it’s now available as an optional feature with Phoenix Broadband's line of outside-plant transponders. No other status  monitoring system has all the advanced features of PowerAgent, and no other system can extend battery life and monitor batteries.

Call Phoenix Broadband today to learn more and to schedule a demonstration.