The demand for technologies that address environmental challenges such as climate change are increasing the workload at Oxford-based engineering consulting firm Mach One Design. We have seen a greater focus from clients on innovations in renewable energy. We’re noticing more work coming through in the electrical energy generation sphere, there’s a lot more interest in battery technology, as well as renewable energy — things like solar, wave, biofuels and wind turbines.
The following case study comes from a client who is based in Oxfordshire. The company develop intelligent battery management and control technology to increase the lifetime and reliability of lithium-ion battery packs for stationary energy storage and electric vehicles. Their product is a game-changing combination of hardware and software that optimizes the use of lithium-ion cells within a battery pack.
Project: EMI Troubleshooting Work on a Large-scale Battery Management System
Timescale: One day site visit to customer’s office
Scopes of work:
A battery management system experienced both conducted and radiated emission issues during the research and development stage. Early pre-compliance EMC tests show that the emissions occur mainly in the 10s of MHz range.
We propose 1 day troubleshooting work at the client’s office. Scopes of work are therefore defined as below:
- To perform EMC pre-compliance tests to benchmark the performance of the device under test (DUT). The results will be compared with the latest lab results, including both radiated and conducted emission tests.
- To troubleshoot the issues by using near-field and current probe methods.
- To design solutions to the issues identified during the troubleshooting session. The solutions should be cost-effective for the clients to implement.
Using our step-by-step troubleshooting approach, we were able to help the clients quickly identify the issues in the system and applied fixes before the end of the day. It was a great co-working experience as the clients’ engineering team is a team of enthusiastic and capable engineers who grasp the knowledge at an amazing speed. I certainly enjoyed this one-day trip.
