Data analysis in battery module production

The increasing demand for electrified power tools and automobiles confronts companies with complex challenges. In order to keep up with the high development speed in this industry, development and production times for prototypes, small and large series must be reduced. A critical process step along the process chain of battery module production is the electrical connection of the individual battery cells. Especially in the field of electromobility, large quantities of battery cells are interconnected in order to fulfil the necessary performance requirements. The interconnection of thousands of cells requires the same number of electrical connections per battery pole. For this particular application, laser beam welding is characterized by a high degree of automation and short process times.

Due to acquisition and analysis of process data during laser beam welding, conclusions can be drawn about the capability of the process and thus about its reproducibility. By using this data, findings obtained during the laser welding process can already be used during the design of a new battery module. By setting up a database, process data can be stored for each battery type and various contacting options.

The design of a new module can be supported by the battery module configurator developed in the Fraunhofer Leistungszentrum at Fraunhofer ILT. Target parameters for the module are specified in the configurator to suggest suitable battery cells and laser-based contacting processes. Based on existing process data, process parameters can be specified or starting points for the development of a process can be recommended.

The pilot line "battery module" deals with the adaptive production of battery modules, where the electrical properties such as energy and power are realized by using different cell types in suitable modules in small to medium quantities from given restrictions of installation space and weight. The utilized technologies are laser beam welding of connector elements and laser bonding. In both of these joining methods, the process signals from the joining processes are evaluated to optimize the parameters and to deepen the process understanding and additionally used in the design process of the battery modules.