Safety Solutions with Fuses and Circuit Breakers for Thermal Runaway Protection

Fusible thermal interface material for traction battery packs that limits thermal runaway propagation in electric vehicle batteries. The material is placed between battery cells and heat exchangers. It transitions from conductive to insulative when temperature exceeds a threshold, preventing thermal propagation between cells. This prevents battery thermal events from spreading like a chain reaction. The fusible interface material prevents catastrophic cell-to-cell thermal runaway in packs.

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Battery system with improved thermal runaway detection and handling using embedded cell sensors and a two-level control method. The system has a battery pack with multiple cell groups and embedded cell sensors in each group. A battery controller network connects to the cell sensors and executes a two-level logic. In low-power mode, a continuous Level-1 logic in the battery controller monitors cell data from the sensors. If a thermal runaway condition is detected, Level-2 logic is triggered to isolate and contain the faulty cell group. This prevents thermal propagation and mitigates runaway spread. The two-level control strategy leverages embedded cell sensors and variable sampling rates to enable simplified thermal runaway detection and handling in battery systems.

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Detection and mitigation of thermal runaway propagation in a vehicle battery to prevent battery damage and safety hazards. The system uses sensors like gas, temperature, and infrared inside modules to detect conditions leading to thermal runaway. If thresholds are exceeded, active relays isolate the faulty module to stop propagation. The battery management system coordinates this based on sensor data. This allows proactive isolation before runaway instead of waiting for voltage/temp indicators.

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Battery system for electric aircraft that prevents thermal runaway propagation between modules to avoid total system failure. The system uses thermal barriers that transition to a lower conductivity state when cells exceed a certain temperature. This reduces heat transfer from compromised cells to the shared cooling structure, preventing thermal runaway spread. The barriers transition from a high initial thermal conductivity state to a lower state when cell temperatures exceed a threshold. This prevents thermal runaway propagation between modules by limiting heat transfer from overheated cells. The shared cooling structure is thermally coupled to all modules to dissipate cell heat.

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Partition member for battery modules that prevents thermal runaway spread in packs with improved cooling capability. The partition member separates battery cells and has a fluid filling inside with a boiling point between 80-250°C. The fluid has a flow channel along the surface of the partition. This allows efficient heat transfer and cooling to prevent thermal runaway spread when a cell overheats. The fluid boils and absorbs heat from the hot cell, preventing nearby cells from reaching runaway temperatures. The partition member is hermetically sealed to contain the fluid. The fluid boiling point range allows it to absorb significant heat without vaporizing at normal temperatures.

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Battery disconnect bracket for electric vehicles that rapidly isolates overheating battery cells to prevent thermal propagation. The bracket is made of materials with different thermal expansion rates. When a cell experiences a thermal event, the bracket expands more on the hot side than the cold side, causing it to transition from a closed conductive position to an open isolation position. This disconnects the hot cell from the others to prevent further thermal propagation. The bracket can also have sensors and an electronic control unit to monitor and manage isolated cells.

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Battery electric vehicle system with improved thermal runaway propagation (TRP) control. The system uses diodes integrated into each battery module to automatically bypass faulty modules during TRP events. This allows the healthy modules to provide power to critical loads like cooling systems and propulsion functions when a module fails open. This prevents total pack failure and enables limited functionality during TRP events. The diodes bypass the faulty module cells while maintaining power to the bus and critical loads.

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Battery management system for electric aircraft that mitigates thermal runaway risks. The system uses sensors to monitor gas and temperature parameters of the battery pack. If conditions indicate potential runaway, contacts are disengaged to isolate the affected cells. This prevents further propagation of thermal runaway within the pack. The system proactively isolates cells before runaway spreads, enhancing safety of electric aircraft.

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A battery pack design and control method to prevent thermal runaway propagation in electric vehicle battery packs. The battery pack has a case with a cavity containing the battery cells. A spray system is installed inside the case that can be activated in case of a thermal runaway event in one cell. The spray system sprays a fire suppressant into the cavity to extinguish the runaway cell and prevent further propagation. The suppressant is a material with a low melting point that turns into a liquid at the high temperatures encountered during runaway. This helps absorb and dissipate the heat from the runaway cell to contain it. The control method involves monitoring cell temperatures and activating the suppressant spray system if a cell reaches a certain threshold indicating runaway.

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Active cell management system for battery packs in vehicles that allows isolating and actively discharging faulty cells to prevent propagation and thermal runaway while maintaining power to the vehicle. The system detects cell faults and isolates the faulty cell to discharge it separately. It actively discharges the faulty cell to a critical low state, preventing propagation, without losing power to other vehicle systems.

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Efficiently discharging battery modules in a vehicle battery pack when a module reaches a critical fault state to prevent thermal runaway and fire propagation. The method involves selectively discharging modules based on spatial distance and thermal resistance to the faulty module. This targets modules closest to the faulty one first to lower their state of charge. If necessary, it can chain discharge through the entire pack to lower all modules. The goal is to reduce cell capacity and prevent further overheating/fires from spreading.

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Battery electric vehicle system that can maintain critical loads and cooling during thermal runaway of battery modules. The system integrates diodes or switches in each module to automatically bypass faulted modules during runaway events. This allows power to continue flowing to essential loads like cooling systems and prevents a full pack shutdown. The bypassed module cells still charge and discharge normally, but the diodes/switches allow current to bypass them during runaway. The overall pack can still provide partial power and cooling during runaway conditions.

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Preventing sudden battery failure in high-density battery packs for electric vehicles, UAVs, etc. by sensing precursor conditions to thermal runaway at the level of individual battery cells. Infrared sensors are used to monitor entire rows of battery cells without requiring individual instrumentation on the cells. The infrared sensors detect temperature changes in the cells to anticipate thermal runaway with sufficient time to prevent sudden battery failure, or to detect and isolate thermal runaway to a particular cell to minimize damage. This allows direct, immediate monitoring of all the cells without cluttering the enclosure or requiring wiring to each cell.

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Battery module design to prevent thermal runaway propagation when a cell overheats. The module has a stack of battery cells and a case to contain them. Between each cell is a thermal runaway prevention unit. When a cell overheats due to fault, the prevention unit absorbs and disperses the heat to prevent direct transfer to neighboring cells. This prevents thermal runaway from spreading through the module.

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Battery rack design to rapidly suppress thermal runaway and prevent spread of fires between modules. The rack has a drainage guide to channel fire suppressant away from uninvolved modules when a module ignites. Each module has an internal fire suppression unit that injects extinguishing agent into the cell case. This prevents cell fires from spreading. The rack case has integrated drainage channels to guide the suppressant out of the rack. This prevents it flowing onto other modules below and causing secondary fires. The rack design enables rapid localized suppression of cell fires without spreading to other modules.

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Battery enclosure design to improve safety of electric vehicle batteries by preventing chain reactions during thermal runaway events. The enclosure has weakened zones on the walls adjacent to the cells. If a cell enters thermal runaway, the weakened zones guide and release the energy instead of propagating to nearby cells. This containment prevents chain reactions and explosions. The enclosure also has thermal isolation panels to divide the cells into groups.

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Battery pack design and monitoring technique to prevent sudden battery failure and thermal runaway in high-density battery packs used in electric vehicles, drones, and other high-power devices. The technique involves using infrared sensors to monitor temperature changes within the array of battery cells without requiring individual instrumentation on each cell. The infrared sensors are arranged in a string or mesh configuration that is routed through the battery pack. They detect sudden temperature spikes in individual cells before the overall battery temperature rises, allowing early intervention to prevent thermal runaway and isolate failing cells. This provides more reliable and proactive thermal management compared to spaced sensors or relying on overall pack temperature.

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Managing thermal propagation in an electric vehicle battery pack to prevent runaway thermal events from spreading through the pack and disabling the vehicle. The technique involves dividing the pack into multiple distinct battery cell module groups that can operate independently and separately disconnect from the vehicle. If a module has an abnormal event like overheating, it can be isolated and cooled while the rest of the pack continues powering the vehicle. This prevents thermal propagation between modules. Alerts are sent if a module fails, and the vehicle can be controlled to pull over or operate with constraints.

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Controlling thermal runaway propagation in battery packs with multiple modules by selectively discharging modules to prevent runaway spread. When a thermal runaway is detected in one module, the controller checks if current is flowing through that module. If not, it decouples the module to isolate the runaway. If current is flowing, it connects the other modules to an external load to discharge them, preventing runaway propagation. This controlled discharge can mitigate thermal runaway chain reactions in battery packs.

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Safety prevention and control system for electric vehicle battery packs that provides active and direct prevention and control for battery faults, thermal runaway, and propagation. The system has three prevention stages: diagnosing faults, detecting cell thermal runaway, and determining pack thermal runaway propagation. It uses a step-by-step prevention execution device that receives instructions from the diagnosis, runaway, and propagation modules. This allows targeted prevention actions based on the specific fault type and runaway stage. It complements passive prevention measures like cooling and extinguishing. The active prevention improves electric vehicle safety by accurately starting prevention mechanisms tailored to the accident stage.

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