BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

afrozhussain08 — Wed, 18 Aug 2021 11:01:41 GMT

Hello everyone

I have an new BBB board i am trying to powerup it with 18650 3.7V 2600mAh battery. I have soldered 0 ohms and 10K resistors at TP5-TP6 and TP7-Tp8 respectively and connected battery positive to TP5 and TP8 to Battery negative power LED just blinks once and off can anyone suggest how to proceed.

Thanks,

Afroz Hussain.

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

david.torres — Fri, 05 Mar 2021 20:24:53 GMT

Hello,

I know this information is from 2013 but I found the post really useful and I wanted to try, hope anyone can help with the following. I have a Beaglebone Black Rev C (PCB Rev B6) and I placed the 0hm resistor between TP5 and TP6, also a 10k resistor between TP8 and TP7, also checked the battery voltage is 3.6v. So I plugged in the battery but whenever I try to turn on the Beaglebone, there is no answer from any led, just a dim blink from the power led every time the power button is pressed. After this I plugged in the micro-usb cable to power on the board (battery and 10k resistor are still connected) and what follows is a permanent blink on the power led. The same happens with the 5v adapter. However when I remove the 10k resistor the board turns on as always.

I tried to see if this is only a problem of the 10k resistor so with the battery still connected I removed the 5v adapter (or micro usb cable) and the board suffered a power outage like there is no battery, as if the battery was not recognized by the board.

The OS version is the following:

Distributor ID: Debian

Description: Debian GNU/Linux 8.11 (jessie)

Release: 8.11

Codename: jessie

Operating System: Debian GNU/Linux 8 (jessie)

Kernel: Linux 4.4.9-ti-r25

Architecture: arm

Thank you very much,

I look forward to receiving your comments.

David

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

shabaz — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 06:54:13 GMT

Hi David,

If you've undone the mod then it should work, and checked the console, then all I can suggest is to double-check your power supply is ok by plugging it into another BBB. Other than that, I can't think what else could be at fault.

Clearly something is not right, but I can't tell what.

Searching on the Internet I see that they made some hardware changes on the BBB from revision A6 and the later revisions, this blog post was written in 2013, but in May 2015 after hardware revision went beyond A5C there was a suggestion to make another hardware modification to prevent possible damage, see the photo here: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/beagleboard/7sxPePT7wkM/_oNSCta5WusJ

I don't know what the risk with post-A5C boards is. Also, I don't know if you hit this issue, or user error, or something unrelated. I'm hoping someone can investigate in detail with the current BBB releases (and there are now many variants in the wild). Anyway, there are now BBB versions that have a LiPo battery connector on them, e.g. the BBB-Blue, so that is an option to some. Another option is to try a USB 5V battery brick (like that used for temporarily powering/charging mobile phones) but again that's not a solution for everyone but at least it means no physical mod needed to the board.

I'm sorry your BBB isn't booting, I can't think what else to try : (

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

dpawlak — Tue, 18 Apr 2017 15:23:10 GMT

Hi Thanks for your comments.

I used an external programmable charger that I use for my drones. When everything's plugged in, It reads 4.0 volts.

I removed the mod and it still does the same thing... basically nothing other than the flicker of the pwr light.

I tried the pwr and reset buttons with 5V supply no go.

I'll put the serial console on it just in case something shows..

Really strange, because the mod looks perfectly viable. I have two more BBBs but I'm nervouse about trying again until I know what's going on.

I'll let you know.

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

dpawlak — Tue, 18 Apr 2017 13:39:09 GMT

Has anyone had problems with this mod?

I executed it exactly as described and bricked my BBB. [View:/resized-image/__size/16x16/__key/commentfiles/f7d226abd59f475c9d224a79e3f0ec07-a8ac1a33-b54d-43af-bfa7-3d1200c9bf54/contentimage_5F00_2.png:16:16]

No reverse polarity, TP5 short to TP6 and connected to positive battery lead of 3.7V LiPo

10K resistor between TP7 and 8, with negative lead of battery to TP8.

The battery has a protection cct and is a 900mAh battery. It was fully charged.

After rechecking all of the connections, I started directly plugging the battery in to the cct. Nothing, not even smoke or heat or burnt smell. The PWR light flickers once and goes out. If I press the PWR button, the PWR light flickers once again and goes out.

I removed the cct to see if something was causing the unit to not pwr up. Nothing. Doesn't respond to either 5V or USB pwr.

I have another BBB, but not knowing what happened, I'm not sure Iwant to risk it, but I need battery backup

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

bigtitan — Wed, 08 Feb 2017 08:19:59 GMT

Hi all,

I tested with latest image of BBB, when supply both DC & battery then cut off DC, some seconds later, BBB also shutdown.

How can we use as an UPS for BBB with bat ?

Thanks

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

olin0 — Sat, 22 Oct 2016 19:17:57 GMT

Hi,

I'm designing a (base) board that uses and plugs BBB as daughter-board (yes, BBB will be mounted upside down as a 'slave-board'). I want to avoid powering BBB via cabled wires. I'm wondering whether I can power the BBB from the base board using 5V connected to the battery pins as described in your article? Is there potential issues? Thank you.

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

Former Member — Wed, 02 Mar 2016 01:39:31 GMT

I'm attempting to run the BBB off of battery only, but I seem to be missing a step.

After plugging in the battery, the board is not reacting. I soldered the resistors and the JST battery connector, then plugged in a fully charged 3.7V lipo battery.

Any insight?

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

w6wdh — Tue, 02 Feb 2016 23:35:01 GMT

HI shabaz,

This is just the thread I was looking for!

I want to attach a LiPo battery to a BeagleBone Black Rev C for reliable shutdown. But when I tried the usual configuration, the battery runs down when the BBB is shut down and the +5V power adapter is unplugged. It appears that the Cape +3.3V and +5V power does not shut off.

I added 4 wires from the BBB battery pins (TP5, TP6, TP7, TP8) to a Molex connector, and soldered a 10Kohm resistor between TP7 and TP8. I wired a 3.7V 1400mAH LiPo battery and a 10Kohm thermistor to the mating Molex connector, and wired it to connect TP5 and TP6 together. That way I can run with or without the battery attached.

To monitor the power voltages, I soldered three LEDs and three 1Kohm resistors to an Adafruit proto cape. The LEDs show Cape +3.3V, Power jack +5V, and Cape +5V. Like this:

[View:/resized-image/__size/620x465/__key/commentfiles/f7d226abd59f475c9d224a79e3f0ec07-a8ac1a33-b54d-43af-bfa7-3d1200c9bf54/5078.contentimage_5F00_184045.jpg:620:465]

If I run the BBB with the battery disconnected, then push POWER switch S3 to shut it down, things look OK. The Cape +3.3V and +5V power shuts off. This is the desired behavior.

[View:/resized-image/__size/620x465/__key/commentfiles/f7d226abd59f475c9d224a79e3f0ec07-a8ac1a33-b54d-43af-bfa7-3d1200c9bf54/2376.contentimage_5F00_184046.jpg:620:465]

If I run the BBB with the battery connected, then press POWER switch S3, the BBB shuts down (blue LEDs stop flashing and the blue PWR LED goes off), but the Cape +3.3V and +5V power is still on. This does not seem right.

[View:/resized-image/__size/620x465/__key/commentfiles/f7d226abd59f475c9d224a79e3f0ec07-a8ac1a33-b54d-43af-bfa7-3d1200c9bf54/1781.contentimage_5F00_184047.jpg:620:465]

This also happens if I run the BBB just on the battery (no +5V power adapter) and then shut it down. The Cape +3.3V and +5V power is still on. This is what I think drains the battery.

[View:/resized-image/__size/620x465/__key/commentfiles/f7d226abd59f475c9d224a79e3f0ec07-a8ac1a33-b54d-43af-bfa7-3d1200c9bf54/8637.contentimage_5F00_184048.jpg:620:465]

So, finally, my question:

Why is the Cape +3.3V and +5V power still on when the battery is connected and the BBB is shut down?

I am running a recent version of Debian Linux. Perhaps there needs to be a patch applied to the PMIC code?

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

pbft — Mon, 23 Nov 2015 20:44:54 GMT

LED on GPIO 117 (gpio3_21, P9 pin 25) on / dim after shutdown

After reading through this I *think* I have a unique problem. I followed all the advice here. Have a battery to allow operation through brief power failures and to allow for graceful shutdown when the user turns off the power switch. Basic operation:

The BBB is powered by a power supply circuit on our cape, through VDD_5V on P9. A power switch is available to the user to turn off the system.
The power switch has a second set of contacts that we monitor with a GPIO pin to detect that the user has turned off the power switch. In this case, we shut down immediately.
We use another GPIO to detect loss of external power. If external power is lost but the user has not switched us off, we monitor battery voltage and shut down when the battery drops below a setpoint.

However, we have an LED controlled by GPIO 117 which comes on dimly after shutdown, whether by our internal interrupt handler or by ssh session 'shutdown -h' command. I'll assume this would eventually drain the battery, and it's confusing at best for the user. Other LEDS controlled by other GPIOs don't exhibit this behavior.

Any suggestions, insights, or wisdom? I've pulled out way too much hair over this already.

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

Former Member — Wed, 21 Oct 2015 19:02:19 GMT

When I shut down the BBB 5VDC power and disconnect the 4 pin connector to the battery and reconnect the battery, the current draw from the battery is approx 23uA.

Once I re connect the 5VDC the BBB starts up again, but when I pull the 5VDC plug it again draws 70-90mA from the battery1

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

Former Member — Wed, 21 Oct 2015 14:18:42 GMT

Are any special commands that have to be sent to the TI power management chip that perhaps the Linux kernal is not sending?

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

Former Member — Wed, 21 Oct 2015 14:17:09 GMT

I will try all measurements again. I am using Agilent DMMs and Agilent power supplies so I do not think measurement accuracy is the issue.

One thing that I notice is that current consumption depends on when the battery was connected to the BBB. If it was connected while 5VDC is unplugged the current in shutdown is quite different from when its is connected after 5VDC is applied. I will try all combinations.

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

Former Member — Wed, 21 Oct 2015 13:37:43 GMT

Without LCD or cloak shutdown current is 0.73mA

RE: BBB - Rechargeable on-board battery system

Former Member — Wed, 21 Oct 2015 10:41:38 GMT

Shabaz did offer his contact details if you look at the post of his:-

If you prefer, please go ahead and get the customer to reach out to me via my e-mail address or mobile number, to quickly hear exactly how they are using it (or we can continue the discussion here, whichever is more convenient).