smart battery charger (power supply) (SBC)
Smart Battery Chargers(SBC) are intelligent, microprocessor-controlledchargers for Smart Batteries( SB). Smart Battery Chargers are characterized by the fact that their charging characteristics are influenced by the Smart Battery. They can change their charging characteristics during the charging process based on the information received from the Smart Battery. This is due to the fact that the microprocessors in the smart batteries communicate with the processors in the smart battery chargers via the system management bus( SMBus).
The combination of Smart Batteries and Smart Battery Chargers therefore offers significant advantages in terms of charging reliability and their efficiency. Each Smart Battery has its own charging characteristics and an optimal charging current that takes into account chemical conversion, capacity and maximum usable charging energy. This also includes reducing charging time and maximizing charging cycles.
These characteristic values are controlled via the SMBus, which is also used to display important characteristic values such as the State of Charge( SoC) or the State of Health( SoH) for the current charge and battery status on the Smart Battery or Smart Battery Charger.
Smart Battery Chargers are classified into two levels based on their charging characteristics: Level 2 and Level 3. Both SBC designs communicate via the SMBus and differ in how they affect charging characteristics. For Level 2 chargers, the Smart Battery presents itself as a slave and the SMBus mode supports only slave operation. In contrast, the SMBus operates as a master-slave for Level 3 chargers.