Hi
I want to power a 5V project from rechargeable batteries.
I am not sure what the day to day draw will be but my guesstimation is 80mA (in standby) to 200-250mA when under full load. I can fit up to 8x18650 cells with some room for charge/boost pcb(s) like the Adafruit PowerBoost 1000 Charger (https://www.adafruit.com/product/2465).
My plan was to start with a moderate mA supply and add to it if-when it turns out the recharge interval is a bit short. I thought this could be achieved by adding a second charger-boost board with its own batteries (2-4 per board) then connecting the boards in parallel with a schottky diode on each supply output, I think this is called Oring. Unfortunately there is the drop across the diodes and heat to contend with.
I have found an active load balance chip, the LTC4370 (https://www.analog.com/media/en/technical-documentation/data-sheets/4370f.pdf) but although this looks like the perfect solution it is hard to find and is crazy expensive.
So I am wondering, because the batteries would be behind the Adafruit board(s) and putting aside the diode voltage drop-heat, am I over complicating things, do I really need an active load balancing system?
Thanks.
I want to power a 5V project from rechargeable batteries.
I am not sure what the day to day draw will be but my guesstimation is 80mA (in standby) to 200-250mA when under full load. I can fit up to 8x18650 cells with some room for charge/boost pcb(s) like the Adafruit PowerBoost 1000 Charger (https://www.adafruit.com/product/2465).
My plan was to start with a moderate mA supply and add to it if-when it turns out the recharge interval is a bit short. I thought this could be achieved by adding a second charger-boost board with its own batteries (2-4 per board) then connecting the boards in parallel with a schottky diode on each supply output, I think this is called Oring. Unfortunately there is the drop across the diodes and heat to contend with.
I have found an active load balance chip, the LTC4370 (https://www.analog.com/media/en/technical-documentation/data-sheets/4370f.pdf) but although this looks like the perfect solution it is hard to find and is crazy expensive.
So I am wondering, because the batteries would be behind the Adafruit board(s) and putting aside the diode voltage drop-heat, am I over complicating things, do I really need an active load balancing system?
Thanks.