Intersil's 12-Cell Li-ion Battery Pack Monitor Safeguards Hybrid and Electric Vehicle Battery Systems

The feature-rich ISL78610 monitors and balances up to 12 cells with accurate voltage readings and diagnostics. This lets system designers make informed decisions based on absolute voltage levels rather than simply receiving a "system not OK" signal indicating an out-of-range condition. The ISL78610 includes a voltage reference, 14-bit analog-to-digital converter and registers for control and data, while connecting directly to a microcontroller through its 2Mbps SPI interface. The device also offers four external temperature inputs, and includes fault detection and diagnostics for all key internal functions.

Intersil's battery monitoring and management ICs meet the stringent safety, reliability and performance requirements of next generation automotive battery pack systems. Together, the ISL78610 and ISL78600 offer internal and external fault detection such as open wire, over and under voltage as well as temperature and cell balancing faults to mitigate battery pack failures. Multiple devices can be daisy-chained together to support systems with up to 168 cells using a proprietary communications system that provides industry-leading transient and EMC/EMI immunity, which exceeds carmaker requirements. Intersil's daisy-chain architecture uses low-cost capacitive isolation with twisted pair wiring to stack multiple battery packs together, while the ICs internal protection guards against hot plug and high voltage transients. A watchdog timer automatically shuts down a daisy-chained IC if communications is lost with the master microcontroller.

"The ISL78610 battery pack monitor provides customers the right combination of Li-ion battery pack monitoring and control features," said Philip Chesley, senior vice president of Precision Products at Intersil. "Teaming the monitor with the ISL78600 battery manager also gives carmakers the robustness, accuracy and redundancy required to achieve an ASIL-D compliant battery management system."

• Monitors up to 12 cell voltages with ±10mV measurement accuracy
• VBAT measurement accuracy ±100mV
• Measures absolute voltage rather than preset voltage levels
• Internal and four external temperature monitoring inputs
• Watchdog timer shuts down device if communications is lost with master controller
• Integrated system diagnostics for all key internal functions
• 2Mbps SPI interface provides communication with microcontroller
• AEC-Q100 Grade-2 qualified for operation from -40°C to +105°C
   

• Monitors up to 12 cell voltages with ±1.5mV measurement accuracy
• Cell voltage scan rate of 20μs per cell
• Passive balancing
• Integrated system diagnostic functions, including cell over and under-voltage, over temperature, open cell monitoring wires, open temperature monitoring wires, VBAT and VSS connection integrity, voltage reference and oscillator function
• AEC-Q100 Grade-2 qualified for operation from -40°C to +105°C
   

The ISL78610 is available now in a 10mm x 10mm, 64-lead TQFP package and is priced at $6.30 USD in 1k quantities. For more information, please visit: www.intersil.com/products/isl78610.

The ISL78600 is available now in a 10mm x 10mm, 64-lead TQFP package and is priced at $7.00 USD in 1k quantities. For more information, please visit: www.intersil.com/products/isl78600.

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