When batteries fail, they can fail spectacularly. If you work in the industry, you would have heard horror stories of explosions, fires, and hospitalisations, particularly as a result of faults with lithium ion batteries.
If lithium or lead acid batteries, or, indeed any rechargeable battery, are a big part of your business, you need a Battery Monitoring System (BMS). The way we look at it, it’s just too risky not to invest in one. A BMS is designed to pick up problems within a battery cell well before anything goes seriously wrong, it does this by monitoring variables like voltage, temperature and state of charge within each cell.
A BMS can do much more than reduce your risk of fires however. We’ve put together a top five list of the ways your business could benefit from a BMS.
- When your BMS is installed, it will enable you to proactively manage faults within individual cells before the problem can affect other cells. A BMS will monitor cells in real-time, this means problems can be addressed ASAP rather than having to wait for routine checks to be carried out by your maintenance team.
- A BMS insures you against the risk of system failure and can save you big dollars. Because it is designed to be super sensitive, a BMS can pick up minor changes in individual battery cells. It only needs one faulty battery cell in a lithium ion battery to damage the entire bank, so installing a Battery Monitoring System could save you major problems PLUS the cost of installation of a new battery system. Your BMS will also ensure you get maximum life out of your battery cells, reducing turnover and therefore costs.
- Your employees don’t need to be battery experts to work with a BMS. A BMS comes with a battery display monitor that details parameters like remaining battery capacity and charge and discharge function. If any parameter slips out of the ‘safe’ zone the BMS will sound an alarm. This means even if a particular worker is not an expert on batteries they can still be rostered on and can handle the issue by contacting your maintenance team.
- A BMS can do more than just monitor faults, it also has a built-in control capacity – this means when problems occur, like over and under-charging of cells, the BMS will actually rectify this issue itself, without the need for your workers to call on maintenance or take other action.
- Finally the Battery Monitoring Systems we stock are flexible and scalable and will support your business while it grows. You won’t need to update your entire battery monitoring system when you expand; your BMS can be scaled up to match your greater needs.
Battery monitoring systems will protect your batteries from problems like sulfation, corrosion, gassing and dry-out. A good BMS, properly installed, is like an insurance policy for your batteries. For that reason regardless of whether your business relies on lithium ion, lead acid