Granted Patent B2

US 8,159,189 · App. 11/951,400 · Granted Apr 17, 2012

Abstract

Claims (56)

1. A state-of-health monitoring and prognosis method for a battery comprising:

monitoring battery terminal voltage and current;

extracting a portion of said battery terminal voltage and current corresponding to an engine cranking event;

determining an intercept voltage (V 0 ) based on the extracted portion of said battery terminal voltage and current signals corresponding to an engine cranking event, wherein the intercept voltage is the battery voltage when the battery current is equal to zero;

obtaining a battery open-circuit-voltage (V ocv ) before the engine cranking event;

estimating a battery voltage loss (V loss ) that occurs during said engine cranking event based on subtracting the battery open-circuit-voltage (V ocv ) from the intercept voltage (V 0 ) and

comparing the estimated battery voltage loss (V loss ) with a predetermined voltage loss threshold ( V loss ) to determine battery state-of-health.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

modeling the battery as an equivalent circuit including an internal battery resistance (Rb), a current flowing through the battery (I), a battery terminal voltage (V), and battery voltage loss (V loss ) in series with a battery open-circuit-voltage (V ocv ), wherein the equivalent circuit is expressed as V=V ocv −V loss +I*R b for discharge currents.

3. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

forming a linear regression model from the extracted portion of the battery terminal voltage and current signals associated with an engine cranking event, wherein the linear regression model defines battery dynamics during engine cranking; and

determining the intercept voltage (V 0 ) and an internal battery resistance parameter (R b ) from the linear regression model.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein obtaining a battery open-circuit-voltage (V ocv ) before the engine cranking event comprises measuring battery open-circuit-voltage (V ocv ).

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein obtaining a battery open-circuit-voltage (V ocv ) before the engine cranking event comprises reading a stored open-circuit-voltage (V ocv ) from a memory device.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein extracting a portion of said battery terminal voltage and current corresponding to an engine cranking event comprises:

extracting the portion of said battery terminal voltage and current within a predefined time interval beginning at a first instant T 1 and ending at a second instant T 2 wherein the first instant T 1 corresponds to an initial voltage drop due to starter engagement and the second instant T 2 corresponds to a first occurrence of current crossing a predefined threshold subsequent to the first instant T 1 .

7. The method of 6 , wherein the predefined threshold is substantially −100 Amps.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein extracting a portion of said battery terminal voltage and current corresponding to an engine cranking event comprises:

extracting a portion of said battery terminal voltage and current that falls within a predefined range of current subsequent to a predetermined initial battery voltage drop due to initial engine cranking.

9. The method of claim 8 , wherein the predefined range of current comprises a range of between about −300 Amps and about −100 Amps.

10. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

collecting data associated with battery temperature and state-of-charge occurring prior to an engine cranking event until an engine cranking event occurs; and

determining said predetermined voltage loss threshold ( V loss ) based on battery temperature and state-of-charge with voltage loss occurring during cranking.

11. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

determining a battery state-of-health index based on the estimated battery voltage loss (V loss ).

12. The method of claim 11 , wherein determining a battery state-of-health index comprises:

generating a battery state-of-health index if the estimated battery voltage loss (V loss ) does not exceed said predetermined voltage loss threshold ( V loss ), wherein the battery state-of-health index is defined as

V

loss

-

V

_

loss

V

fresh

-

V

_

loss

*

100

⁢

%

,

wherein V fresh is a nominal residual value for good batteries.

13. The method of claim 11 , wherein comparing the estimated battery voltage loss (V loss ) with said predetermined voltage loss threshold ( V loss ) to determine battery state-of-health comprises:

generating a warning message indicating a bad battery if the estimated battery voltage loss (V loss ) exceeds the predetermined voltage loss threshold ( V loss ).

14. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:

providing a battery state-of-health signal to notify a user of the battery state-of-health.

15. A state-of-health monitoring and prognosis system for a vehicular battery used in an engine starting application, comprising:

a signal preprocessing module for receiving a plurality of inputs from a plurality of sensors that sense a plurality of battery parameters, wherein the signal preprocessing module determines an intercept voltage signal based on extracting battery current and voltage signals corresponding to an engine cranking event and obtains a measure of battery open-circuit-voltage signal before the engine cranking event;

a voltage loss estimation module providing a voltage loss signal corresponding to battery voltage loss that occurs during engine cranking events based on subtracting the measure of battery open-circuit-voltage from the intercept voltage signal; and

a state-of-health evaluation module providing a battery state-of-health signal based on said voltage loss output signal.

16. The state-of-health monitoring and prognosis system as claimed in claim 15 , wherein said state-of-health evaluation module compares said voltage loss signal to a predetermined voltage loss threshold to determine said battery state-of-health.

17. The state-of-health monitoring and prognosis system as claimed in claim 15 , wherein said voltage loss estimation module includes an equivalent circuit model of the battery including an internal battery resistance (R b ), a current flowing through the battery (I), a battery terminal voltage (V), and battery voltage loss (V loss ) in series with a battery open-circuit-voltage (V ocv ), wherein the equivalent circuit is expressed as V=V ocv −V loss +I*R b for discharge currents.

18. The state-of-health monitoring and prognosis system as claimed in claim 15 , wherein said signal preprocessing module extracts a portion of battery terminal voltage and current that falls within a predefined range of current subsequent to a predetermined initial battery voltage drop at the inception of the engine cranking event.

Assignments (12)