Boosting cell capacity with electronic balancing circuits

It turns out that if you use smart circuitry to balance the current draw from weaker and stronger battery cells, you can get on the order of 30% more power out of the bank of cells. That was the message from Analog Devices Inc. with its SuperCap demo system. It uses cell balancing chips (LTC3300-1) to simulate active balancing of 12 Li-ion cells, represented by 72 supercaps. The demo board shows what happens when the stack discharges freely versus when cell balancing is in effect – basically, sending charge from stronger cells to adjacent weaker ones. Analog Devices says that several Japanese automakers are using the LTC3300-1 ICs to boost the range of their battery packs.
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