Our company has over 3500 laptop batteries for which we need to access
their working status using some type of battery analyzer
product/system. The analyzer needs to be able to assess at minimal
the following:
** Determine if the battery is Working or Non-Working
** Determine if the battery is able to hold a charge
** Assess the performance of the battery as it relates to the
manufacturers specification as a health or % index
The time it takes to perform this assessment needs to be provided.
Also, ideally the device will connect to a computer via a serial/USB
in order to automate the testing and reporting of battery status.
The biggest obstacle that we have found to this initiative is that
it seems certain laptop batteries have properietary communication
protocols which are used by the laptop vendor to connect to the
battery, collect battery status, etc. Unless this protocol is
engaged, the battery appears as an open circuit to the testing device.
Thus a challenge is finding a solution which allows
measurement/assessing regardless of the presence or type of
communication bus. Using a laptop for each battery type is not
practical or efficient in our current environment. In addition, PCs
generally gauge their results on what the battery says it is...not the
true state of the battery.
The solution(s) need to cover at minimum the following Make/Models of
batteries; ideally one solution is preferred but not required:
COMPAQ PP241B
COMPAQ 2911
COMPAQ PP2051A
COMPAQ 21-7982-001
COMPAQ 2871B
COMPAQ 2871
COMPAQ 2891
COMPAQ 134099
TOSHIBA PA3009U
TOSHIBA 24584U
TOSHIBA PA3038U
TOSHIBA PA2457-UR
TOSHIBA PA2487U
IBM 02K7016
IBM 12P4065
IBM 41H8136
IBM 29H9033
DELL 5081P
DELL 1691P |
Request for Question Clarification by
jbf777-ga
on
16 Sep 2003 20:16 PDT
Hello -
I have made a contact with a company that seems like they may have a
product that looks promising for this application.
In the meantime, can you tell me, is your 3rd item,
"Assess the performance of the battery as it relates to the
manufacturers specification as a health or % index"
absolutely necessary? I don't know if any product would do that.
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Clarification of Question by
dcw75028-ga
on
16 Sep 2003 21:40 PDT
The ability to assess the battery's performance as it relates to the
manufacturer's specification in "mAh" is a key requirement. Cadex is
a company who has a product that will do it for a numerous laptop
batteries. Unfortunately, they don't have a solution for the battery
models we have defined. This is key as the ability of the battery to
hold a certain threshold charge, e.g. 85%, is important in assigning
its resell value.
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Request for Question Clarification by
jbf777-ga
on
16 Sep 2003 21:51 PDT
Do you know if these are smartbus batteries?
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Clarification of Question by
dcw75028-ga
on
17 Sep 2003 05:49 PDT
I have not heard of them explicitly referred to as that in the
conversations I have had, but would say the name would
apply...especially to the Compaq and Dell batteries. These batteries
appear to utilize a communications protocol/bus to interface to the
laptop. This negotiation appears to be required in order to be access
the battery (else you have an open circuit). That's one of the main
challenges we are seeing here.
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Request for Question Clarification by
jbf777-ga
on
17 Sep 2003 10:50 PDT
And these busses are indeed proprietary. I just talked to a rep at
Cadex myself, and he says they all have their own flavor of the SM
bus. I thought perhaps there was a solution that interfaced
generically into a "standard" SM bus. This is not the case.
That being the case, I only see 2 solutions:
1) Have something built
2) Buy the independent laptops for these models
There is the remote possibility that each of these manufacturers have
access to a battery tester that they might be able to sell (through
most likely a 3rd party vendor they use). Have you contacted any of
these companies?
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Request for Question Clarification by
jbf777-ga
on
17 Sep 2003 16:20 PDT
Hello -
I've happened upon a retired electronics engineer that might be
interested in building something for you. Can you give me a little
more information about what you're trying to do? Would you be
interested in something like this?
jbf777-ga
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Clarification of Question by
dcw75028-ga
on
18 Sep 2003 07:04 PDT
The goal was to find a "ready" solution that would address the
needs/function defined originally. The concern with building
something is both (a)cost and (b) timeframe. Besides the cost of the
laptops, the use of laptops has another issue in that most cases its
not a true assessment of the battery but rather a "read" of a gauge in
the battery itself which may or may not be good.
What about vendors:
Vencon Technologies Inc.
179 Patricia Ave., Toronto Ontario
M2M 1J6 Canada
Tel: (416) 226-2628, Fax: (416) 226-5196
or
LaMantia Products Ltd.
1663 Jubilee Dr.
London, Ontario, Canada, N6G 5K4
EMAIL: info@lamantia.ca
www.lamantia.ca
TEL: 519-472-5566 / 800-673-3585
FAX:519-472-1702
Can they help here?
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Request for Question Clarification by
jbf777-ga
on
18 Sep 2003 07:54 PDT
I don't think you're going to find an off-the-shelf solution.
I already talked to Vencon. Nothing there. Just got off the phone
with LaMantia. The rep said "couldn't you use our battery tester if
you have access to the contact points" but didn't seem like he he
could address the smart-bus obstacles. I.e., he didn't explicitly
say, "this product bypasses the smart-bus." And this certainly isn't
going to give you your 3rd item, even if on the very off chance it
worked.
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Request for Question Clarification by
jbf777-ga
on
18 Sep 2003 21:02 PDT
Just got a break on a possible new lead for an off-the-shelf product.
I'm going to check into it and let you know shortly.
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Request for Question Clarification by
jbf777-ga
on
23 Sep 2003 06:43 PDT
I think I may have found someone who says it's possible without the
need for a smart interface. I'm in the process of finding out some
more information.
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Clarification of Question by
dcw75028-ga
on
23 Sep 2003 07:22 PDT
That is good news. Is this with an off the shelf product? For the
models listed, have you found out definitively which ones use a
SmartBUS and which ones do not.
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Request for Question Clarification by
jbf777-ga
on
23 Sep 2003 09:09 PDT
No, I haven't gone about it that way. Figured it doesn't really
matter, since you need a solution for all these batteries, and an
off-the-shelf solution won't work for those that don't adhere to the
Smartbus standard. If they all adhered to the standard, it would be a
simple issue. However, the problem is, there may be slight deviations
from the standard, which means you need a solution that bypasses it
altogether.
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Request for Question Clarification by
jbf777-ga
on
23 Sep 2003 09:10 PDT
Also, what I'm investigating is a combination off-the-shelf product
with "work around."
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Request for Question Clarification by
jbf777-ga
on
23 Sep 2003 09:23 PDT
Here is an email I received back from the individual who I've been
dialoging with. I don't know what your budget is, but this individual
might be interested in a consulting arrangement with you.
Essentially, what he is proposing is to use an off-the-shelf product
to test the battery, and bypass the SMBus by a little "handiwork."
"Adherance to SMBus standard means basically that a
battery pack has two additional pins - bus and data,
and internal ability to communicate to the host information
about remaining capacity and other stuff using SMBus
language.
The test I proposed bypasses SMBus altogether and is
applicable to both dump and SMBus aware battery packs.
The only problem in your case whould be to make the pack
detect "system present" - otherwise you will not even
see any voltage on its terminals. There is no common way
to do it - you will have to experiment. Some packs will have
no system present detection (if you can see voltage on left and right
pins).
The most difficult case will be if the pack will not accept
"system present" until it sees communication on clock and data
lines. In this case you _will_ need some kind of SMBus interface
to produce such communication. Any of Arbin or Maccor offers which
are SMBus aware will provide such communication.
If you need to go on cost-saving side, you can purchase a tester
from Cadex (for making the charge-discharge test I described),
while providing dummy SMBus communication using SMBus emulator.
You can purchase such things from texas instruments (it is part
of evaluation pack for our gas-gauging ICs, for example for bq2083).
The SMBus emulator is EV2300.
I should warn you however that while Cadex/SMBus emulator will by
match
cheaper then Arbin system, it will be a lot of handiwork (you will
have
only one channel with SMBus emulator, and setting it up will take you
a lot
of effort). You will be able to communicate with the pack via the
emulator, and you will be able to satisfy its "line present"
requirement for discharging, if pack has such, but setting up all this
will be a hassle. You will still need to experiment with "system
present" pin for every particular battery pack.
[In terms of finding out the "health index" of the battery, he adds:
Compare the obtained capacity value Qmes with the one written on the
pack Qnew.
health = (Qnew-Qmes)*100/Qnew]"
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Request for Question Clarification by
jbf777-ga
on
23 Sep 2003 17:45 PDT
Is this a viable option?
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Request for Question Clarification by
jbf777-ga
on
24 Sep 2003 10:56 PDT
Unfortunately, the testing system made by Maccor is around $20K.
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