Platform for Research on the Conditions of Use of LiFePO4 Batteries in Order to Increase Their Service Life

The battery is one of the key elements in the electric vehicles industry, being the most important storage medium for electricity. Current technologies offer us a wide range of energy storage cells. For the electric vehicles industry, one of the most widely used are the high-capacity LiFeP04 cells connected in series and/or parallel. The management of the functional parameters (charging / discharging mode, voltages, current, temperature, equalization voltages, etc.) determines the duration of use of these electricity storage devices. The objective of the research platform is the implementation of an automatic long-term monitoring system for a low voltage battery pack, consisting of 4 high-capacity LiFeP04 cells (CALB CAI80AH, 3.2 V, 180 Ah) connected in series. The system monitors the cells voltages, the pack current, and the cells temperatures. The data acquired by a microcontroller are processed and displayed on a local LCD screen and further transmitted to a computer. The developed LabVIEW application is used to analyze the system behavior, and based on this analysis, the optimal conditions of use are derived for an increased service life of battery cells.