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ArduPilot / ardupilot

ArduPlane, ArduCopter, ArduRover, ArduSub source
http://ardupilot.org/
GNU General Public License v3.0
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Support Common Smart BMS boards. #19434

Open geofrancis opened 2 years ago

geofrancis commented 2 years ago

I have been looking to find a BMS that is compatible with ardupilot for use on ROVER and have been struggling to find anything that you can actually buy without emailing the company just to get a price.

These BMS board are very popular in the Scooter and ebike community as they are reliable and totally programmable via bluetooth over uart. can be used with any chemistry, The protocol is documented so everything is there for it to be added. they are very reasonably priced, available from 3s to 30s and can be found on aliexpress and ebay.

https://www.lithiumbatterypcb.com/product-category/smart-bms/

the protocol documentation can be found here https://www.lithiumbatterypcb.com/Protocol%20English%20Version.rar

hendjoshsr71 commented 2 years ago

@geofrancis Have you used any of these before? Are there other manufacturers that use this communication protocol?

Do you know of any repositories that have the protocol coded already?

I'm not a big fan of having bluetooth on my battery modules, but I could see the benefit for some. My one worry for a quick look is generally being able to disable over current protection is quite important for flying things.

The other downside to these is that they use serial which means taking a serial port from another device. CAN and I2C would be better protocol choices as then you can have more batteries on the same bus.

I'm actively looking for companies and products in this space to integrate with ArduPilot. I received one positive response so far and Pomegrante Systems has been gracious enough to send me a few boards

Pomegrante Systems Power Module

Please let me know if you know of others?

geofrancis commented 2 years ago

I use these for my custom ebike batteries and by battery trailer range extender, I havent had a single problem with them. as I said they are very popular with the ebike and scooter crowd due to them being very reliable and cost effective. sure canbus stuff would be nice, but they dont exist, only some battery monitors and I couldn't find smbus devices either outside a handful of very expensive premade batteries and a clone of the solo board.

here are a few other projects using them https://github.com/kolins-cz/Smart-BMS-Bluetooth-ESP32 https://github.com/markandkymward/SMART-BMS-Bluetooth-Cell-Voltage-Monitor-HILTEC/ https://gist.github.com/JustGand/bdd6e1ae562c0dea850d3a023db42025 https://github.com/bres55/Smart-BMS-arduino-Reader

hendjoshsr71 commented 2 years ago

Awesome! Would you have recommendations for one or two poroducts (6s) and any auxiliary products I would need for these?

On Sat, Dec 4, 2021 at 4:56 PM geofrancis @.***> wrote:

I use these for my custom ebike batteries and by battery trailer range extender, I havent had a single problem with them. as I said they are very popular with the ebike and scooter crowd due to them being very reliable and cost effective. sure canbus stuff would be nice but it just doesnt exist at the moment. neither do smbus devices outside a handful of very expensive premade batteries.

here are a few other projects using them https://github.com/kolins-cz/Smart-BMS-Bluetooth-ESP32

https://github.com/markandkymward/SMART-BMS-Bluetooth-Cell-Voltage-Monitor-HILTEC/ https://gist.github.com/JustGand/bdd6e1ae562c0dea850d3a023db42025

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geofrancis commented 2 years ago

I personally have the 14s 30a board in my ebike battery and the 60a 6s for my trailer, there is an andoid/apple app for configuring them so I would get it with the bluetooth module so you can use the app to get up and running but think they also have windows software for configuring it over uart.

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4000431587955.html

I am looking to use this in rover applications where there will be solar power, I looked at a lot of methods and a smart BMS is really the only way to safely manage the batteries,

geofrancis commented 2 years ago

If your planning on adding these I will order another for testing.

hendjoshsr71 commented 2 years ago

I am going to buy one. But no promises on any timeframe. It will take at least 4-6 weeks to get here. And not being one of the standard protocols it will take more time. (If the BMS was coming from from the battery cell/pack folks I know on AliExpress I'd be more inclined. But on AliExpress products come and go...)

amilcarlucas commented 2 years ago

We are using a couple of Rotoye Batmon's, they are correctly integrated and work great as long as you do not use a CubeBlack flight controller.

The price is also ok, but yes you do need to e-mail them to get the barebone batmon without battery.

geofrancis commented 2 years ago

We are using a couple of Rotoye Batmon's, they are correctly integrated and work great as long as you do not use a CubeBlack flight controller.

The price is also ok, but yes you do need to e-mail them to get the barebone batmon without battery.

can you tell me what the price is? all they have on the site is $600 for 4 and you have to ship your batteries to them to get fitted.

geofrancis commented 2 years ago

I am going to buy one. But no promises on any timeframe. It will take at least 4-6 weeks to get here. And not being one of the standard protocols it will take more time. (If the BMS was coming from from the battery cell/pack folks I know on AliExpress I'd be more inclined. But on AliExpress products come and go...)

They are very common and are resold and rebranded by a few manufacturers, as far as I know they have never changed their protocol. https://youtu.be/ClGmMY0kXvQ https://youtu.be/uCC_3LoLYuw https://youtu.be/k8Wkg-tVnx8

geofrancis commented 2 years ago

We are using a couple of Rotoye Batmon's, they are correctly integrated and work great as long as you do not use a CubeBlack flight controller.

those are just battery monitors, they cannot disconnect the battery incase of over/undervoltage or balance it.

amilcarlucas commented 2 years ago

Yes, they cannot (and must not) disconnect the battery in case of over/under-voltage.

But according to the manufacturer they do balance the battery during both changing and discharging.

geofrancis commented 2 years ago

I would never recommend a smart battery can can disconnect for use on aircraft, thats where the Rotoye Batmons are better suited. This BMS support is for solar charging rovers where the battery is going to be cycled daily to its extremes and backup power is in place.

I ended up ordering one of the 3s 20a boards for my solar boat. with the plan of using the onboard phone to manage it until its eventually integrated into ardupilot. it cost me £23 shipped. https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005002306907257.html