• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.247-255
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• 2018

This paper proposes a transformer design of a direct cell-to-cell active cell balancing circuit with a multi-winding transformer for battery management system (BMS) applications. The coupling coefficient of the multi-winding transformer and the output capacitance of MOSFETs significantly affect the balancing current transfer efficiency of the cell balancing operation. During the operation, the multi-winding transformer stores the energy charged in a specific source cell and subsequently transfers this energy to the target cell. However, the leakage inductance of the multi-winding transformer and the output capacitance of the MOSFET induce an abnormal energy transfer to the non-target cells, thereby degrading the transfer efficiency of the balancing current in each cell balancing operation. The impacts of the balancing current transfer efficiency deterioration are analyzed and a transformer design methodology that considers the coupling coefficient is proposed to enhance the transfer efficiency of the balancing current. The efficiency improvements resulting from the selection of an appropriate coupling coefficient are verified by conducting a simulation and experiment with a 1 W prototype cell balancing circuit.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.279-285
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• 2019

This study proposes an enhanced switching pattern that can improve energy transfer efficiency in an active cell-balancing circuit using a multiwinding transformer. This balancing circuit performs cell balancing by transferring energy stored in a specific cell with high energy to another cell containing low energy through a multiwinding transformer. The circuit operates in flyback and buck-boost modes in accordance with the energy transfer path. In the conventional flyback mode, the leakage inductance of the transformer and the stray inductance component of winding can transfer energy to an undesired path during the balancing operation. This case results in cell imbalance during the cell-balancing process, which reduces the energy transfer efficiency. An enhanced switching pattern that can effectively perform cell balancing by minimizing the amount of energy transferred to the nontarget cells due to the leakage inductance components in the flyback mode is proposed. Energy transfer efficiency and balancing speed can be significantly improved using the proposed switching pattern compared with that using the conventional switching pattern. The performance improvements are verified by experiments using a 1 W prototype cell-balancing circuit.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.367-376
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• 2016

This paper presents a cell balancing method for a single switch flyback converter with a multi-winding transformer. The conventional method using a flyback converter with a multi-winding transformer is simple and easy to control, but the voltage of each secondary winding coil might be non-uniform because of the unequal effective turn-ratio. In particular, it is difficult to control the non-uniform effect using turn-ratios because secondary coil has a limited number of turns. The non-uniform secondary voltages disturb the cell balancing procedure and induce an unbalance in cell voltages. Individual cell control by adding a switch for each cell can reduce the undesirable effect. However, the circuit becomes bulky, resulting in additional loss. The proposed method here uses the conventional flyback converter with an adjustment made to the output filters of the cells, instead of the additional switch. The magnitude of voltage applied to a particular cell can be reduced or increased according to the adjusted filter and the selected switching frequency. An analysis of the conventional converter configuration and the filter design method reveals the possibility of adequate cell balancing control without any additional switch on the secondary side.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Industry Convergence
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.451-459
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• 2022

Recently, in accordance with the demand for a large capacity of a secondary battery according to an increase in the demand for energy storage devices, a modular series battery configuration is essential. Accordingly, various cell balancing techniques have been proposed to prevent high efficiency and performance degradation of the battery. In this paper, propose a battery voltage balancing topology consisting of a flyback DC/DC converter type of a SIMO (Single-Input-Multiple Output) two-switch configuration for a series battery configuration. The proposed topology shows a structure in which a DC/DC converter connected to each module and a battery cell share one transformer. The topology cell balancing operation is a principle in which the voltage balancing converter of the battery converges to the same value through a transformer that shares a magnetic flux with the cells constituting the module through a single high-frequency transformer. In this paper, the dynamic characteristics analysis of the proposed circuit using PSIM was based and it was verified through experiments on one module.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Illuminating and Electrical Installation Engineers
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.22-29
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• 2015

The AC-LED driving system which is connected directly to alternative current source is suitable for commercialization because of it's simple structure and low cost. However, it requires additional circuits compensating for current differences between the parallel connected LED strings. In this paper, we proposed the circuit compensating for current error of the three LED strings using the Y type balancing transformer. The proposed Half-bridge AC Chopper LED driving system used the ferrite material's balancing transformer. at the same time, it is able to dimming control. The proposed system is applied to 80W AC-LED module consist of three parallel strings. Experiment results present that Power factor and THD measured with power analyzer are 0.958 and 26.473% respectively satisfied with IEC61000-3-2 harmonics standard.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• v.12 no.5
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• pp.1812-1820
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• 2017

This paper analyzes a symmetric active cell balancer for a battery management system. The considered cell balancer uses a forward converter in which the circuit structure is symmetric. This cell-balancing method uses fewer switches and is simpler than the previously proposed active cell-balancing circuits. Active power switches of this cell-balancing circuit operate simultaneously with the same pulse width modulation signals. Therefore, this cell-balancing circuit requires less time to be balanced than a previous bidirectional-forward-converter-based cell balancer. This paper analyzes the operational principles and modes of this cell balancer with computer-based circuit simulation results as well as experimental results in which each unbalanced cell is equalized with this cell balancer. The maximum power transfer efficiency of the investigated cell balancer was 87.5% from the experimental results. In addition to the experimental and analytical results, this paper presents the performance of this symmetric active cell-balancing method.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.223-231
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• 2015

LEDs have been widely used in lighting displays, automobiles, and airplanes owing to their excellent light output characteristics and long lifespan. Though LEDs are manufactured under the same process, variations in impurity concentrations cause electrical deviation among LEDs. The resulting electrical deviation can not only reduce the life time of the LED but also cause non-uniform luminance of LEDs connected in parallel. LED driving circuit is required to solve these problems. In this paper, we propose a LED driving system using Y-type current balancing transformer to maximize the efficiency of the system by removing output stage Schottky diodes. Experimental results are presented to verify the performance of proposed LED driving system that is applied to 80 W LED modules.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.861-871
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• 2016

With high penetration of renewable energies, power electronic transformers (PETs) will be one of the most important infrastructures in the future power delivery and management system. In this study, an isolated bidirectional modular multilevel DC/DC converter is proposed for PET applications. A modular multilevel structure is adopted as switching valves to sustain medium voltages to achieve modular design and high reliability. Only one high-frequency transformer is used in the proposed converter, which significantly simplifies the circuit and galvanic insulation design. A dual-phase-shift modulation strategy is proposed to regulate the output power and achieve a simple voltage balancing control. A down-scaled (2 kW/20 kHz) prototype is constructed to demonstrate the proposed converter and verify the control strategy. The experimental results comply with the theoretical analysis well, with the highest power efficiency reaching 97.6%.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.12 no.6
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• pp.869-877
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• 2012

This paper presents a current-balancing circuit for security lights that uses parallel-connected LEDs. The parallel connection of LEDs causes current differences between the LED strings because of characteristic deviations. These differences can reduce the lifespan of a particular point of LEDs by thermal spotting. They can also cause non-uniform luminance of the lighting device. Among the different methods for solving these problems, the method using current-balancing transformers makes it easy to compensate for current differences and it has a simple circuitry. However, while the balancing transformer has been applied to AC light sources, LEDs operate on a DC source, so the driving circuitry and the design method have to be changed and their performances must be verified. Thus in this paper, a design method of the balancing transformer network and the driving circuitry for LEDs is proposed. The proposed design method could have a smaller size than the conventional design method. The proposed circuitry is applied to three types of 100-watt LED security lights, which use different LEDs. Experimental results are presented to verify the performance of the designed driving circuits.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Illuminating and Electrical Installation Engineers
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.26-32
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• 2013

The LED has the proportional characteristic between the flux of light and its current and has caused voltage-current deviation on production process. Thus the unbalancing of each LED strings current occurred by its characteristic deviation. This unbalancing reduce a uniformity of the flux of light. Therefore, we researched to design method the LED driver based on DSP and the balancing transformer for a LED current balancing. These are applied to 50W LED module consist of 4 parallel strings. We analyzed the reduction of LED currents unbalance by experimental result from each method.