Creating a data-driven strategy for digitalized, sustainable battery cell manufacturing – TechnoNews

The additional growth and evolution of current storage techniques is a key prerequisite for the power transition. The Middle for Digitalized Battery Cell Manufacturing (ZDB) on the Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Engineering and Automation IPA and acp techniques AG have joined forces to fee a winding system for cylindrical battery cells that includes versatile codecs and design.

It serves as an revolutionary analysis and manufacturing platform to check new cell codecs and parts together with tab designs and in addition permits growth of large-format cells for future battery applied sciences. The winding system is the primary of its type on this planet. It’s embedded in an automatic, digitalized battery cell manufacturing infrastructure.

Electrical automobile batteries include a number of modules, each comprising many particular person battery cells. These modules are the centerpiece of any battery and are chargeable for the lion’s share of worth creation. Cylindrical battery cells have grown increasingly more well-liked within the automotive trade lately, with the development favoring massive cell codecs.

ZDB at Fraunhofer IPA and acp techniques AG labored collectively intently to develop, assemble, and now fee a winding system for cylindrical battery cells, also called spherical cells. It can function a flexible analysis and manufacturing platform for fast testing of recent cell codecs and tab designs in addition to superior strategies of enhancing high quality and optimizing processes.

The brand new winding system completes a manufacturing line in contrast to another in Europe for the manufacturing of cylindrical battery cells for lithium-ion batteries and future battery applied sciences corresponding to sodium-ion batteries. The particular characteristic of the manufacturing chain is that the entire course of steps are digitalized and interconnected, from coating and winding to meeting, filling, and forming.

“At ZDB, we can cover all of the process steps involved in manufacturing a battery cell. The winding process is one of the core processes in cylindrical cell production, as the jelly roll is the centerpiece of the battery cell. By bringing the winding system online, we have closed a gap in the fully digitalized process chain, so the production line is complete,” says Julian Grimm, head of the analysis staff at Fraunhofer IPA and Deputy Head of ZDB.

Electrodes and separators rolled up into jelly rolls

There are a couple of dozen work steps concerned in getting a cell prepared to be used. Throughout the winding course of, the optimistic and unfavourable electrodes are rolled up along with two separators to kind a jelly roll. After that, the battery is assembled, a step that requires the jelly roll to be moved and positioned with nice accuracy. A rod electrode is then inserted by the central gap within the roll and used to weld the roll to the bottom of the cylinder.

However the brand new winding system for cylindrical battery cells is greater than only a manufacturing platform for jelly rolls. It can additionally function a analysis platform for growing revolutionary cell techniques and codecs and testing their high quality.

“What makes our system unique is its flexibility. It allows us to realize different cell formats in different sizes and tab designs, such as tabless designs, which don’t have a tab welded onto them. The tab, a narrow terminal element on the anode and cathode that the electricity has to flow through, is the chokepoint in large-format cells,” Grimm says.

In spherical cells, the development is towards bigger cell codecs, which take up extra space when it comes to each diameter and peak. This implies the roll and the cell itself find yourself being bigger. However the situation is that the bigger the cells are, the tougher it’s to gather the present and dissipate warmth.

“We can respond to this challenge with individual tab designs. In a tabless design, for example, the carrier foil made of aluminum and copper can serve to collect current and dissipate heat, enabling greater conduction of both than a traditional tab,” Grimm explains.

Modern cell designs guarantee homogeneity in cylindrical cells, permitting for big cell codecs. Bigger cells with extra energetic materials can be utilized to realize better power density, which in flip extends the vary of electrical automobiles.

Information assortment related to battery cells

To attenuate waste and enhance high quality, your entire manufacturing course of is digitalized and interconnected. To that finish, sensors accumulate information, which is then aggregated in actual time within the cloud. Traceability applied sciences developed at Fraunhofer IPA make it doable to affiliate the information collected with the battery cells produced.

Every particular person battery cell produced is out there for information analyses and to coach synthetic intelligence. On this means, it’s doable to hint the circumstances below which the cell was produced and decide how they relate to the ultimate product high quality.

The information is used to develop companies with monitoring, evaluation, and predictive capabilities. This makes it doable to enhance the manufacturing course of and get rid of sources of error sooner than earlier than.

“Innovative cell designs require redesign and optimization of production processes, which we can study using the winding system. The combination of innovative cell design and agile approaches to production is the key to meeting the requirements of a rapidly changing energy landscape, enabling faster market launches of new solutions, and paving the way forward for sustainable, high-quality battery technologies,” Grimm says.

Producers and customers of electrodes, separators, and cells also can use the system to check their prototypes, merchandise, cell parts, supplies, and designs.