Battery pack and method of manufacture
AssigneeBlack & Decker Inc.
InventorsDaniel J. White, Matthew J. Velderman, Michael Varipatis, Nathan J. Osborne
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A method of manufacturing a battery pack including the creation of a support board for enabling conversion of the battery pack from providing a first voltage to providing a second voltage. The support board is created by injection molding about a precut set of power traces for coupling a converting element to a plurality of battery cells. The power traces couple the plurality of battery cells to a set of battery pack terminals. The support board may be mechanically coupled to a battery cell holder.
Claims7
A battery pack for providing power to a first electrical device having a low rated operating voltage and a second electrical device having a medium rated operating voltage, the battery pack comprising:
- a set of battery terminals, the set of battery terminals including a first subset of battery terminals and a second subset of battery terminals for providing a rated output voltage to the electrical device;
- a set of battery cells including a first subset of battery cells and a second subset of battery cells;
- a single electromechanical interface configured to couple the battery pack to the first electrical device and to the second electrical device and provide an output voltage to the coupled electrical device;
- a switching network that (1) electrically couples the first subset of battery cells and the second subset of battery cells in parallel when the electromechanical interface is coupled to the first electrical device to provide a low rated output voltage from the battery pack to the first electrical device through the first subset of battery terminals only, wherein the low rated output voltage corresponds to the low rated operating voltage and (2) electrically couples the first subset of battery cells and the second subset of battery cells in series when the electromechanical interface is coupled to the second electrical device to provide a medium rated output voltage from the battery pack to the second electrical device through the first subset of battery terminals and the second subset of battery terminals, wherein the medium rated output voltage corresponds to the medium rated operating voltage.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.