Automotive current sensing and coulomb counting
Solutions for reliable battery monitoring and protection
Tailored current sensing and coulomb counting solutions for accurate state of charge (SoC) measurement and fast overcurrent detection (OCD) in battery management systems. Our shunt resistor sensing ICs feature a fully integrated programmable embedded system, while our automotive XENSIV™ TLE4972 Hall sensor provides robust and stable current measurements in EMC prone environments.
Highly accurate current sensing and coulomb counting
The SoC curve of lithium-ion battery is almost flat because it is highly sensitive to the cell's voltage, temperature, and age. A subtle change of the voltage indicates a significant increase or decrease of SoC. Therefore, coulomb counting is a much reliable method to measure SoC.
The current sensor triggers the battery protection unit (BCU) to disconnect the loads from the battery cells. OCD events must be detected and disconnected in less than few microseconds to protect the passengers, the load, and the battery from a thermal runaway event.
Programmable shunt resistor sensing ICs solutions
- Fully integrated programmable embedded system for battery monitoring and management
- Arm® Cortex® M0+ processor running at up to 48 MHz
- Programmable and reconfigurable analog and digital blocks
- Memory: 128 KB of code flash with ECC protection.
The PSoC™ 4 HV PA microcontroller family is offered in a 32-QFN package with wettable flanks.
Robust and superior stability with coreless Hall sensor technology
- Magnetic coreless current sensor: An analogue sensor signals proportional to the measured current and two fast overcurrent detection pins.
- Robust against stray fields and suited for current measurements in EMC prone environments, due to differential measurement principle. e.g., in-phase current sensing in a motor application.
- Superior stability over temperature and lifetime: The digitally assisted analogue concept supported by proprietary stress and temperature compensation and the well-established and robust Hall technology.
- Avoids negative effects (saturation, hysteresis) by core-less design: Common issue of sensors using iron cores for flux concentration.
