Effects of Vibration on the Electrical Performance of Lithium-Ion Cells Based on Mathematical Statistics

Lithium-ion batteries are increasingly used in mobile applications where mechanical vibrations and shocks are a constant companion. There is evidence both in the academic and industrial communities to suggest that the electrical performance and mechanical properties of the lithium-ion cells of an electric vehicle (EV) are affected by the road-induced vibration. However, only a few studies related to the effects of vibration on the degradation of electrical performance of lithium-ion batteries have been approached. Therefore, this paper aimed to investigate the effects of vibration on the DC resistance, 1C capacity and consistency of NCR18650BE lithium-ion cells. Based on mathematical statistics, the method changes of the DC resistance and the capacity of the cells both before and after the test were analyzed with a large sample size. The results identified that a significant increase in DC resistance was observed as a result of vibration at the 95% confidence level, while typically a reduction in 1C capacity was also noted. In addition, based on a multi-feature quantity, a clustering algorithm was adopted to analyze the effect of vibration on cell consistency; the results show that the cell consistency had deteriorated after the vibration test.