Dexerials Corporation

Sony Chemicals Corporation

Sony Corporation

Sony Chemical & Information Device Corporation

Yuji Furuuchi

Yoshihiro Yoneda

Koichi Mukai

Masami Kawazu

Chisato Komori

Kazutaka Furuta

Takashi Fujihata

Kazuyuki Sakakibara

Hisaya Tamura

Koji Ejima

Toshiaki Araki

Masahiro Matsuyoshi

Motohide Takeichi

Norikazu Iwasaki

Kazumasa Sakakibara

Provided is a protection circuit capable of reliably preventing an overcurrent or a sneak current after cutoff to improve safety, implementing cost reduction with a device configuration simpler than conventional device configurations, and further reducing a failure rate of a device. In a protection circuit, after one of two fuse elements provided in each of a plurality of protection elements is blown due to an overcurrent flowing along a current-carrying path, a heater provided in at least one of the plurality of protection elements generates heat due to a sneak current flowing via the plurality of protection elements on the current-carrying path which is remained and blows the other of the two fuse elements provided in the at least one of the plurality of protection elements.

Protection circuit, battery pack, and protection circuit operating method

Provided is a protection circuit capable of reliably preventing an overcurrent or a sneak current after cutoff to improve safety, implementing cost reduction with a device configuration simpler than conventional device configurations, and further reducing a failure rate of a device. In a protection circuit, after one of two fuse elements provided in each of a plurality of protection elements is blown due to an overcurrent flowing along a current-carrying path, a heater provided in at least one of the plurality of protection elements generates heat due to a sneak current flowing via the plurality of protection elements on the current-carrying path which is remained and the current-carrying path which is remained is cut off due to destruction of the heater.

A switch device capable of safely opening an electrical circuit in response to an abnormality such as wetting with water or liquid leaking from a battery. The device includes a first conductor connected to an external circuit and having a relatively high ionization tendency, and a second conductor arranged close to the first conductor and having a relatively low ionization tendency which is lower than that of the first conductor, a reaction part which electrically corrodes the first conductor is formed by a liquid between the first and second conductors.

Switch device, electronic component, and battery system

A fuse device includes a fuse element and a cooling member, wherein the fuse element includes a low thermal conductivity portion having a relatively low thermal conductivity in which an interrupting portion that is blown out by heat is separated from the cooling member, and a high thermal conductivity portion having a relatively high thermal conductivity, provided in a portion other than the interrupting portion, and in contact with or close to the cooling member.

Fuse device

It is an object of the invention to provide an electric wire having an excellent electrical conductivity in use of the high melting point metal and being able to surely cut off by fusing the conductive material itself at a temperature lower than the melting point of the high melting point metal, even where heat is generated from flowing overcurrent in the electrical circuit. The electric wire of the invention has a feature including a conductive material formed of a first conductive member made of a low melting point metal, and a second conductive member made of a high melting point metal, which are provided adjacent to each other, wherein the conductive material is fused by erosion of the high melting point metal according to melting of the low melting point metal.

Electric wire

A fuse element comprises a low melting point metal layer, a first high melting point metal layer having a higher melting point than a melting point of the low melting point metal layer, and a restricting portion including a high melting point material having a higher melting point than a melting point of the low melting point metal layer and configured to restrict flow of the low melting point metal or deformation of a layered body constituted by the first high melting point metal layer and the low melting point metal layer.

Fuse element, fuse device, protective device, short-circuit device, switching device

A switch device capable of safely opening or short-circuiting an electrical circuit in response to an abnormality such as wetting with water or liquid leaking from a battery is provided. The device includes first and second conductors connected to an external circuit, and a reaction part including an insulating material which changes state on contact with a liquid, the first and second conductors being electrically connected or disconnected by the insulating material changing state on contact with the liquid.

In a protective circuit substrate having a circuit substrate and a protective element, the protective element including: an insulating substrate; a heat-generating element; first and second electrodes laminated on the insulating substrate; a first and second connecting terminals provided on one side edge of a mounting surface to be mounted to the circuit substrate, the first connecting terminals being continuous with the first and second electrodes; a heat-generating element extracting electrode provided in a current path between the first and second electrodes and electrically connected to the heat-generating element; and a meltable conductor provided between the first and second electrodes, wherein the circuit substrate includes a region for mounting the protective element in which no electrode pattern other than a connecting electrode to the protective element is provided.

Protective circuit substrate

A protective element includes: a rectangurarly shaped insulating substrate; a heat-generating element formed on the insulating substrate; first and second electrodes laminated on a surface of the insulating substrate; first and second connecting terminals provided on a back surface of the insulating substrate and being continuous with the first and second electrodes; a heat-generating element extracting electrode provided on a current path between the first and the second electrodes and electrically connected to the heat-generating element; and a meltable conductor laminated on a region extending from the heat-generating element extracting electrode to the first and second electrodes and to be melted by heat to interrupt the current path between the first electrode and the second electrodes; wherein at least one of the corner portions of the insulating substrate is chamfered.

Protective element and protective circuit substrate using the same

A protective element including a substrate having a first insulating member and a concave portion formed thereon, a heating body layered on the concave portion of the substrate, a second insulating member layered on the substrate so as to cover at least covering the heating body, first and second electrodes layered on a surface of the substrate on which the second insulating member is layered, a heating body electrode layered on the second insulating member so as to be superimposed with the heating body, and electrically connected to a current path between the first and the second electrodes as well as onto and the heating body, and a low-melting point metal layered from the heating body electrode toward the first and the second electrodes configured to cause a blowout of the current path between the first and the second electrodes by heating.

Protective element, protective element fabrication method, and battery module in which protective element is embedded

A charging/discharging control device that can protect a chargeable/dischargeable battery cell from an excess current state while preventing the device from being increased in scale and from being complex. The charging/discharging control device includes: switches that are connected in parallel on current paths between a battery and a positive terminal of a battery pack; a switching control unit that switches between a charging current path and a discharging current path; a protective element that fuses the charging current path when a current value of the charging current path flowing through the switch exceeds a first fusing current value; and a protective element that fuses the discharging current path when a current value of the discharging current path flowing through the switch exceeds a second fusing current value higher than the first fusing current value.

Charging/discharging control device, battery pack, electrical equipment, and charging/discharging control method

A protection circuit is provided, which protects a battery pack from overcurrents and overvoltages using sensing means and a protection device having a heating resistor and a fuse element provided on a circuit board. This protection circuit allows for sharing a protection device regardless of the current rating and the voltage rating of the battery pack, thereby being manufactured at low costs.

Protection circuit

A protective element has a heat-generating member and a low-melting metal member on a substrate, in which the low-melting metal member is blown out by the heat generated by the heat-generating member, wherein at least two strips of low-melting metal member are provided as the low-melting metal member, for example, between the pair of electrodes that pass current to the low-melting metal member, so that the lateral cross section of at least part of the low-melting metal member is substantially divided into at least two independent cross sections. This protective element has a shorter and more consistent operating time. It is preferable here to provide at least two strips of low-melting metal member between the pair of electrodes that pass current to the low-melting metal member. It is also preferable to provide one strip of low-melting metal member having a slit in its center, between the pair of electrodes that pass current to the low-melting metal member.

Protective element

A secondary battery deviceincluding multiple protective circuits U-Uconnected in parallel and each having two fuses f, fconnected in series, wherein a terminal tof each heater h is connected to a switch elementvia rectifier element D-D. Even if a potential difference is generated between terminals t, no residual current flows because any one of the rectifier elements D-Dis reverse-biased.

Secondary battery devices

A protective element with improved spherical segmentation performance during the melting of a low-melting metal member, has a heat-generating member and a low-melting metal member on a substrate, in which the low-melting metal member is heated and blown out by the heat generated by the heat-generating member. There is a region in which the low-melting metal member is suspended over the underlying base (such as an insulating layer), and when S (&#x3bc;m) is the surface area of a lateral cross section of the low-melting metal memberbetween a pair of low-melting metal member electrodesandorandsandwiching the region, and H (&#x3bc;m) is the height at which the suspended region is suspended, then the relationship H/S&#x2267;5&#xd7;10is satisfied. It is preferable here that the upper surfaces of both of the pair of low-melting metal member electrodes protrude beyond the upper surface of the underlying insulating layer.

Growing community of inventors

Tochigi, Japan

Yuji Furuuchi