I have a battery bank configured like this:
Where the batteries are TN 54Ah Lithium Iron Phosphate (LiFePO4) Battery. The batteries have internal cell balancing, and built-in automatic protection for over-charge, over discharge, over current and over temperature. These are NOT Victron batteries.
From what I understand from the educational document "Wiring Unlimited", I infer that the battery balancer, performs the actual balancing by adding a small resistance to either side (left/right) of the series of batteries, and thereby skew the current in either side:
If the Left side shows higher voltage, add minor resistance on Left to increase the current delivered to the Right. And of course vice versa.
Question 1: Is my understanding of the way that a battery balancer works correct?
Despite that lithium batteries, have internal cell balancing, and built-in automatic protection for over-charge, over discharge, over current and over temperature, the theory of battery balancing still applies for Lithium batteries because of the resistance in the circuit of batteries, so battery balancers are NOT overkill.
Question 2: Is it correct that battery balancers remain an essential element in the long term maintenance of the circuit?
Kind regards
Bjorn