Apparatus and method for an electric power supply with changeable electric connectivity between battery modules

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10442309-B2
Application number	US-201615551820-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 27, 2016
Priority date	Apr 30, 2015
Publication date	Oct 15, 2019
Grant date	Oct 15, 2019

Abstract

A traction power source for electric vehicles in a single unit. Specifically, traction power source integrates several functions, such as the battery and inverter. In addition, further functionalities that are traditionally in separate units can be integrated into the system and efficiently performed by the same electronics, such as battery management and thermal management.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. An electrical circuit comprising:
at least three battery modules, wherein;
each of said battery modules comprises at least one battery subportion and at least two electric switches,
each of said battery modules is electrically connected to at least a second of said battery modules through at least one electric inter-battery-module connection line, and
said at least two electric switches in each battery module are configured to change an electric connectivity between a first battery subportion of one of said battery modules and at least one second battery subportion of another of said battery modules between at least two alternatives of the electric connectivity by effective switching of said electric switches; and

at least one auxiliary power supply bus, wherein the at least one auxiliary power supply bus comprises at least two electric terminals that are pairwise electrically connected to at least two noncongruent electrical contacts of at least one battery subportion of at least one battery module.

2. The electrical circuit of claim 1 , wherein said at least two alternatives of the electric connectivity include at least two of the following:
the at least one battery subportion of one battery module is electrically conductively connected in series with the at least one battery subportion of another battery module;
the at least one battery subportion of one battery module is electrically conductively connected in parallel with the at least one battery subportion of another battery module; and
the at least one battery subportion of one battery module is bypassed so that not more than one of the at least two noncongruent electrical contacts of the at least one battery subportion of said battery module is electrically conductively connected to the at least one battery subportion of another module.

3. The electrical circuit of claim 1 , wherein said at least two alternatives of the electric connectivity comprise at least the following:
the at least one battery subportion of one battery module is electrically conductively connected in series with the at least one battery subportion of another battery module; and
the at least one battery subportion of one battery module is bypassed so that not more than one of the at least two noncongruent electrical contacts of the at least one battery subportion of said battery module is electrically conductively connected to the at least one battery subportion of another module.

4. The electrical circuit of claim 3 , wherein said at least two alternatives of the electric connectivity further comprise the following:
the at least one battery subportion of one battery module is electrically conductively connected in parallel with the at least one battery subportion of another battery module.

5. The electrical circuit of claim 1 , wherein the at least one battery subportion of one battery module is configured to be electrically conductively connected in series with the at least one battery subportion of another battery module with positive electrical polarity and with negative electrical polarity.

6. The electrical circuit of claim 1 , wherein said at least one battery subportion in each of said at least three battery modules is an electrochemical energy storage cell with an energy content of at least 3 Wh.

7. The electrical circuit of claim 1 , wherein at least one of the said electrical energy storages is a double-layer capacitor, in which energy is stored in Helmholtz charge double layers.

8. The electrical circuit of claim 1 , wherein at least two battery subportions comprise different storage types such that they differ in at least two of the following characteristics by at least 50%:
energy capacity;
energy capacity per mass density;
peak power per mass density;
durability;
operating voltage range;
maximum specified current rise time;
specified peak current; and
cost.

9. The electrical circuit of claim 1 , further comprising at least one electric machine.

10. The electrical circuit of claim 9 , wherein said at least one electric machine is an alternating current machine with at least three electric phases.

11. The electrical circuit of claim 9 , wherein said electric machine is operated at a voltage of at least four times a module voltage formed by the electrical energy storage elements of the respective module with the highest module voltage.

12. The electrical circuit of claim 1 , wherein the at least one auxiliary power supply bus uses a rated voltage that does not deviate from a multiple of 12 V by more than 25%.

13. The electrical circuit of claim 1 , wherein the at least one auxiliary power supply bus comprises at least one separate electrical energy storage which is operated at the voltage of the at least one auxiliary power supply bus.

14. The electrical circuit of claim 1 , wherein the at least one auxiliary power supply bus further comprises at least two terminals each of which is electrically connected to at least one of said electric inter-battery-module connection lines.

15. The electrical circuit of claim 1 , wherein a temporal average voltage of the at least one auxiliary power supply bus is lower than a maximum voltage the battery modules can generate between the at least two electric inter-module connection sites to which the at least two terminals of the at least one auxiliary power supply bus are electrically connected.

16. The electrical circuit of claim 15 , wherein the temporal average voltage of at least one auxiliary power supply bus is lower than a third of the sum of the battery subportions of the battery modules.

17. An electrical circuit comprising:
at least three battery modules, wherein:
each of said battery modules comprises at least one battery subportion and at least two electric switches,
each of said battery modules is electrically connected to at least a second of said battery modules through at least one electric inter-battery-module connection line, and
said at least two electric switches in each battery module are configured to change an electric connectivity between a first battery subportion of one of said battery modules and at least one second battery subportion of another of said battery modules between at least two alternatives of the electric connectivity by effective switching of said electric switches; and

at least one auxiliary power supply bus, wherein:
at least one auxiliary power supply bus further comprises at least two terminals each of which is electrically connected to at least one of said electric inter-battery-module connection lines, and
the at least one auxiliary power supply bus is configured to be temporarily disconnected from at least one of its terminals by at least one electric switch.

18. The electrical circuit of claim 1 , wherein the at least one auxiliary power supply bus further comprises at least one transformer.

19. The electrical circuit of claim 18 , wherein the electrical circuit comprises at least one rectifier.

20. The electrical circuit of claim 1 , further comprising at least two auxiliary power supply busses.

21. The electrical circuit of claim 20 , wherein the at least two auxiliary power supply busses differ in voltage by at least 25%.

22. An electrical circuit comprising:
at least three battery modules, wherein:
each of said battery modules comprises at least one battery subportion and at least two electric switches,
each of said battery modules is electrically connected to at least a second of sai

Assignees

• Porsche Ag

Inventors

• Goetz Stefan

Classifications

• H02J2105/30

  the load networks being external to vehicles, i.e. exchanging power with vehicles · CPC title

• H02J7/65

  against overtemperature · CPC title

• H02J7/64

  against overvoltage · CPC title

• H02J7/62

  against overcurrent · CPC title

• H02J7/56

  Active balancing, e.g. using capacitor-based, inductor-based or DC-DC converters · CPC title