Battery Management System Using Relay Contactor by

Arduino Controller for Lithium-ion Battery

1THITIWUT SATHAPORNBUMRUNGPAO, 2DONWIWAT MOONJUD, 3UTHEN LEETON

1Department of Mechatronic, Engineering, Institute of Engineering, Suranaree University of Technology

Nakhon Ratchasima, THAILAND

2Department of Electrical, Engineering, Institute of Engineering, Suranaree University of Technology

Nakhon Ratchasima, THAILAND

3Department of Electrical, Engineering, Institute of Engineering, Suranaree University of Technology

Nakhon Ratchasima, THAILAND

Abstract: Currently, almost every lithium-ion used in many electronic products has new capabilities. When the

battery's capacity is too large or insufficient, the battery's performance will be damaged. A battery management

system (BMS) is currently order from China and other countries. This is expensive, thousands of, and cannot be

modified. This research aims to design and develop an NMC18650 lithium-ion battery used in the battery

management system (BMS) 3 cells of 12 Vdc can provide the highest circuit of 2000 mAh as a microcontroller

to program according to the configuration of researchers. In this study, the discharge test's effect was 0.5A. The

results show that the critical point decreases at 2.8 Vdc This battery management system will lower the discharge

voltage of any battery by 3 Vdc To prevent danger from occurring in the battery.

Keywords: Battery Management System, Lithium-ion batteries, Arduino Controller, Relay Contactor.

Received: May 16, 2022. Revised: October 11, 2022. Accepted: November 18, 2022. Published: December 31, 2022.

1. Introduction

Lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) are widely used.

There is a strong power supply. Moreover, stable all

the time and can be recharged into a new charge

(SoC). Long service life. It is environmentally friendly

and can store more energy than other types of batteries

in both mass (gravimetric energy density) and

volumetric energy density (volumetric energy

density). Light weight makes it convenient, as shown

in Figure 1, so it has many applications with electrical

appliances. That need to be charged, such as batteries

of mobile phones, digital cameras, electric bicycles,

laptops, and medical equipment, including the

application of LIBs to electric vehicles (EV) [1] to

power vehicles such as the Tesla electric car, the

Honda e: HEVs, for example, by LIBs are based on

electrochemical principles when charged, lithium ions

move out of the anode structure through the

semipermeable membrane into the cathode, forming a

compound of lithium and carbon. Furthermore, at the

same time, electrons will move from the positive to

the cathode through the external circuit. Furthermore,

the reaction occurs in the opposite direction at the

discharge time. The process by which lithium ions are

inserted into the anode or cathode material is called

lithium intercalation.

Therefore, the voltage imbalance between batteries

may be caused by various factors, such as the change

of use environment, lifetime, and voltage imbalance

between cells.

Fig. 1. The ability to store electrical energy from different types of

batteries [2].

Therefore, a battery management system (BMS) is

used in conjunction with a small control system.

(Microcontroller) to control the system's operation and

can program to configure various conditions

(Condition), which can be applied in various

applications, as well as program commands to control

the Input / Output pins. In this research, we choose

Arduino UNO R3, which can receive both Analog and

Digital [3] and can be commanded to control various

devices connected to the circuit with Arduino. It is

also cheap and easy to buy.

2. Literature Review

2.1 Principle of Lithium-ion battery

Lithium-ion batteries operate based on the

electrochemical principle. The electrical energy that

International Journal of Chemical Engineering and Materials

DOI: 10.37394/232031.2022.1.3

Thitiwut Sathapornbumrungpao,

Donwiwat Moonjud, Uthen Leeton

E-ISSN: 2945-0519

Volume 1, 2022

we charge causes a chemical reaction inside the

battery. Chemical reaction forces the lithium ions to

flow out of the structure of the cathode material. Then

flows through the electrolyte, then through the

separator, and intercalate is in the structure of the

anode material. This reaction causes the cathode

materials such as LiMO2, LiM2O4, and LiMPO4 and

the anode materials such as C, Sn, and Si to become

unstable. While in use is discharge, chemical

reactions in the battery can occur as Spontaneous

reactions. In other words, lithium ions flow out of the

structure of the cathode material. They are, moreover,

inserted into the anode terminal. It flows out of the

anode material structure and into the original cathode

material structure, re-stabilizing the system and

allowing electrons to pass through the electric circuit,

where electrons flow through the current metal

collector and output electrical energy. Whenever all

the lithium ions flow back to their original state, the

reaction will either end or run out of charcoal. Which

the battery is used, it must be charged again, which

continues until the battery is depleted and the life of

that battery type is reached.

In general, each type of battery has different

discharge characteristics. As can be seen, lithium-ion

batteries have a higher voltage than other types of

batteries. It depends on how to look at the green line

as shown in Figure 2 with voltage. The maximum

power is about 4.2Vdc. Then when the load is

connected to the battery, there will be a slight

decrease in voltage and gradually decreases according

to the duration of the current consumption of the load

that is used to a particular value; it will cut off. The

work point is called the cutoff point about 3Vdc. In

this research, a lithium-ion battery type NMC was

selected. The material used for the cathode is nickel

manganese cobalt, and the anode is silicon because it

has a long life, provides more voltage than other

types of batteries, and is lightweight. In addition, be

easy to carry and suitable for experiments or research,

which can be used as a prototype in the future and

can increase the voltage even more.

Fig. 2. Discharge characteristics of Li-ion, lead acid, Ni-Zn, NiCd,

NiMH and Zn-MnO2 cells. [4]

2.2 Lithium-ion battery components

Lithium-ion batteries have four main

components [5], as shown in Figure 3.

1) The electrode consists of the cathode and

the anode.

2) The separator prevents the cathode from

coming into contact with the anode terminal until a

short circuit occurs.

3) electrolyte (Electrolyte) is a solution of

lithium salts, which acts as a conductor that allows

ions to flow but does not allow electrons to pass

through. Therefore, it is a good ionic conductor. But

it is a bad electronic conductor.

4) Current collector is the part of the

conductor metal that allows electrons to flow through

the external circuit and lead to the use of electrical

energy such as copper (Cu), aluminum (Al), etc.

Fig. 3. Lithium-ion battery components [2]

2.3 Analog read for Arduino

For the Arduino board, the Analog output

channel has a resolution (Resolution) at 10 bits,

which means 210 = 1024 level. It can accept Analog

to Digital Converter (ADC) input voltage. The

maximum value is VCC or 5Vdc ADC can be

calculated from Equation 1

(1)

Where Ui is analog voltage input and U0 is

Ground voltage input. The Arduino board will accept

both voltage values and process them through

Comparator, as shown in Figure 4, and output them

as Digital data enter the computer.

Fig. 4. Block diagram of analog to digital conversion [6]

International Journal of Chemical Engineering and Materials

DOI: 10.37394/232031.2022.1.3

Thitiwut Sathapornbumrungpao,

Donwiwat Moonjud, Uthen Leeton

E-ISSN: 2945-0519

Volume 1, 2022

3. Methodology

3.1 Equipment

The experiment used all equipment following as.

1) Lithium-ion batteries type NMC18650

2) Arduino UNO R3 Board.

3) Magnetic Relay 7 pcs.

4) Load spec 500 mAh.

5) Imax B6 80W digital charger

3.2 Prepare equipment

1) The NMC18650 lithium-ion battery was

assembled by first connecting two batteries in parallel

and then using spot welding to connect the nickel to

the positive and negative terminals of the LIBs, as

shown in Figure 7, to obtain three cells to increase the

current.

2) Serialize all three battery cells to increase the

battery voltage to 12Vdc

Fig. 7. The battery pack has a capacity of 12Vdc

3) Charge this battery pack and balance each cell's

voltage with the Imax B6 80W digital charger. Then

measure the voltage on the battery pack with a digital

multimeter, and the total voltage is 12Vdc. All three

cells' voltage is 4Vdc.

4) Connect the experimental circuit as shown in

Figure 8.

5) Discharge of the battery by using a digital

charger Imax B6 80W to find the current that the

battery dissipates equally to 2000 mAh

6) Install all seven magnetic relays and connect

the circuit to connect. With Arduino board by using a

breadboard to help connect the electricity to flow

fully, as shown in Figure 8.

7) Connect a lithium-ion battery to supply power.

And then connect a 0.5A load.

Fig. 8. The experiment circuit.

3.3 Experimental design

The experiment tries to determine the critical

voltage of lithium-ion batteries. First, connecting a

0.5A lamp device to the battery pack discharges its

electricity to the point where one of the battery cells

has a dramatic voltage drop. Then, all the recorded

voltage values plot to show the theoretical trend, as

shown in Figure 2.

From figure 9, found that the second cell battery

has a critical voltage of 2.8Vdc. Battery usage

Therefore set the cut-off point of the discharge circuit

at 3Vdc

Fig. 9. Test the battery to discharge to determine the critical

voltage.

3.4 The battery management system test

The researchers are Testing the battery management

system by defining various conditions, as shown in

Figure 10, to stop discharging to the load. Connecting

a lithium-ion battery to a 1600 mAh load, the voltage

measured from the battery's three cells is logged

every minute.

International Journal of Chemical Engineering and Materials

DOI: 10.37394/232031.2022.1.3

Thitiwut Sathapornbumrungpao,

Donwiwat Moonjud, Uthen Leeton

E-ISSN: 2945-0519

Volume 1, 2022

Fig. 10. BMS Program Operation Diagram.

4. Experimental Result

Voltage critical point from connecting the

0.5A load and letting the battery discharge from

Figure 11, the voltage of each cell from 4Vdc will

gradually decrease. The second battery has a voltage

drop faster than the other cells, indicating that the

second cell has lower battery health than the others.

After the voltage is 3Vdc, the second cell battery has a

lower voltage drop. Rapidly, while cells 1 and 3

tended towards the same direction. The battery's total

voltage is the yellow line with a starting voltage of

12.0Vdc. When discharged, the voltage drops to a

critical point of 10.7Vdc. In testing, it found that the

battery management system can cut the discharge

from the battery to load according to user-defined

conditions to prevent damage to the battery.

Fig. 11. BMS Program Operation Diagram.

5. Conclusion

This research aims to design and develop the NMC

18650 lithium-ion battery used in a 3-cell 12Vdc

Battery Management System (BMS) capable of

providing a maximum capacity of 2000 mAh. The

experiment used a microcontroller For the user to set

the voltage rating to stop the battery discharge. The

results of the discharge test to a 0.5A load showed that

this battery pack has a critical point of 2.8Vdc, so this

battery management system will not discharge to the

load at any cell voltage below 3Vdc to prevent harm to

the battery. Furthermore, the battery management

system (BMS) can modify various program

configurations and be researched and applied to

batteries with higher voltages, such as 24Vdc, 48Vdc,

72Vdc, Etc, making them applicable to a wide range of

electrical equipment.

Acknowledgment

This work was supported by the Suranaree

University of Technology.

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International Journal of Chemical Engineering and Materials

DOI: 10.37394/232031.2022.1.3

Thitiwut Sathapornbumrungpao,

Donwiwat Moonjud, Uthen Leeton

E-ISSN: 2945-0519

Volume 1, 2022