Balancing The Battery - Omron LD-250 User Manual

7.3 Power and Charging
Charge a Standalone Battery
The docking station provides a charging port on its left side. Use the supplied manual charge
cable with this port. Manually charging a spare battery enables you to exchange batteries in
approximately five minutes, minimizing the time that an AMR is not operating.
You can also use this port to charge a spare battery while the primary battery is in the LD-250.
However, you cannot charge both batteries at the same time. The battery port is disabled while
an AMR is on the dock and charging.
After you connect a battery, there is an approximate 10-second delay before the amber charging
LED illuminates.

Balancing the Battery

The battery contains multiple cells, which must remain balanced to maintain maximum run
time.
IMPORTANT: The time interval between battery balancing events affects the
length of time required to balance a battery. A battery that is significantly out of
balance can take 10 or more hours to balance after charging.
There are three ways to manage battery balancing:
Balance the battery at every charge
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Set the AMR's DockUntilDoneCharging parameter to True. The battery is balanced every
time the AMR docks and charges. It takes approximately 10 minutes to balance the bat-
tery after charging, and the AMR does not report a full charge until balancing is com-
plete.
NOTE: Omron recommends this mode for applications where you do not
manually exchange batteries.
Exchange the battery after a short interval (hours) with a charged, balanced spare.
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Periodically exchange the in-service battery with a fully charged spare battery.
A spare battery plugged into a docking station is automatically balanced after charging.
This eliminates the need to periodically remove the battery from the AMR for balancing.
However, it requires that you manually exchange batteries.
The optimum interval between exchanging batteries depends on the AMR's use. This
includes the weight it carries, the electrical load of any accessories, and percentage of
time it is in service. You must determine the optimum interval for your application.
Exchanging batteries at each shift change is common.
NOTE: Omron recommends this mode for battery balancing if you are
not charging the battery while it is inside the AMR.
Exchange the battery after a longer interval (days) with a charged, balanced spare.
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Set the AMR's DockUntilDoneCharging parameter to False, to let the AMR get a partial
charge by docking. Then set the StateOfChargeToChargeTo and MinutesToChargeFor para-
122 LD-250 Platform User's Guide 20472-000 Rev B