How to fix the most common errors on a Bosch PowerPack battery
The Bosch PowerPack comes in three variants depending on the battery capacity: 300 Wh, 400 Wh or 500 Wh. The layout of the circuit boards are slightly different but the function is the same. All variants of the battery consists of fourty 18650 sized lithium-ion cells. The manufacturer of the cells might vary with Samsung, Panasonic, Sony, and LG all having produced batteries for the PowerPack battery.
Opening up the battery
When you open up the battery, we would advise you to use plastic tools at all times. Their non conductive nature is good for working with batteries and you lower the risk of cutting cables in the process. We used a “car panel removal tool kit” from Aliexpress.
The video below shows the procedure. The guy in the video uses a screwdriver as well as hex key to open the battery. This can be very dangerous since there might be a full load on the battery, even if it is not turning on.
Inspect the PCB
Once you have removed the battery from the plastic container and have unplugged the power cables, you can get a better view of the BMS board. The most common issue is a faulty Schottky Diode. This repair is both easy to do as well as being very cheap. The diode is priced at less than 10 cents and can be changed in couple of minutes. In the video below, you can see more examples of common mistakes and how to fix them.
For further resources there is an excellent blog post made by a German guy, which can be found here – link. For more details on how the battery cells function, a forum post from Endless Sphere covers the topic here – link. On Reddit there is a post regarding these issues. The thread is still live, so if you have any questions you can post them there – link.
