Smart battery packs
Build the board into the pack. Each pack reports its own cells, charge, health and cycle count to any aircraft it is plugged into.
Smart battery management · drones, robots and beyond
Every cell
on the bus.
A drone battery is a stack of cells, and any one of them can fail first. MODB boards watch every cell, keep the pack balanced, and report it all to the controller that runs your machine — flight controller, robot or vehicle — over a standard, isolated CAN bus.
01 / Why it matters
A drone battery is six cells, not one voltage.
Most flight controllers read one pack voltage from a power module. A weak, hot or drifting cell hides inside that number and shows up only as voltage sag under load — usually late in the flight, when it matters most.
MODB watches each cell on its own and puts that data on the bus the aircraft already uses. The flight controller can then act on the weakest cell, not the average.
02 / What a MODB does
Measures. Balances. Reports. Stays out of the power path.
A monitor, a balancer, a fuel gauge and a CAN node in one board. It carries no power switch, so it can never be the reason an aircraft loses power.
01
Measures
Every cell voltage, pack voltage and up to five temperatures, continuously. Accurate to ±5 mV per cell at 25 °C.
02
Balances
Bleeds the high cells so the pack stays even — during charge, at rest, even in sleep. No balance charger or host command needed.
03
Reports
Puts every cell, charge (SoC) and health (SoH) on the flight controller’s CAN bus as standard DroneCAN battery messages.
04
Never disconnects
No power switch in the pack path. A BMS that cuts power in flight turns a cell warning into a crash. It detects and reports; your controller decides.
03 / Applications
Where it fits.
Built first for drones, where a battery surprise ends a flight. The same board reports to any controller that needs to know what its cells are doing.
In the air
Retrofit on the airframe
Keep stock packs. Mount the board on the frame, plug in the balance lead, and the flight controller sees every cell.
Drone docks and swap stations
The dock powers the CAN bus and the pack wakes by itself. Cell data and balancing run through the whole charge, with no one pressing a button.
Multi-pack and heavy-lift
One board per pack, all on one CAN bus. Each pack reports under its own ID, so the flight controller tracks every battery separately.
Beyond drones
Ground robots and AGVs
Pack data straight into the robot controller over isolated CAN, so the controller schedules charging and derates on real cell data — not a guess from pack voltage.
24–44 V on one board · higher as stacked segments
Light EVs
Cell voltages, temperatures and pack current to your motor controller or VCU. The BMS reports; your controller or contactor acts, on rules you set.
MODB-SB · 100 A continuous measured · stack for 36–48 V
LiFePO4 storage and field power
12 V and 24 V LiFePO4 on a single board, 48 V as two stacked. Telecom backup, portable power stations and solar storage that report every cell.
MODB-SB · 4S / 8S / 2 × 8S LiFePO4
Marine and underwater
Boards built for conformal coating, with the CAN side isolated from pack ground — useful when a vehicle shares one bus across several packs.
Either board · enclosure and sealing by you or the lab
04 / Made to fit your system
Your battery. Your limits. Your controller.
A locked, closed-box BMS decides your cell count, your limits and when your power goes off. MODB is configured for your battery and reports to your controller — and where the standard boards stop, the lab works out the right configuration with you.
AspectTypical locked BMSMODB
Cell countFixed at the factory. A different pack needs a different board.Set per build: 3–8S or 6–12S, and stackable in series for more.
Protection limitsFactory-set, often undocumented.Every threshold and delay is a documented parameter you set.
ChemistryOne chemistry per model.LiPo, LiHV, Li-ion or LiFePO4, selected in configuration.
Your dataBehind a vendor app or an undocumented serial link.Every cell, temperature and fault on an isolated CAN bus.
ProtocolWhatever the vendor chose.DroneCAN today. CANopen, J1939 or your own protocol on request.
Power cut-offThe BMS cuts power on its own rules.No switch on the board: your controller decides.
05 / Which BMS do I need?
Two boards. Pick by pack.
MODB-BB covers the big packs. MODB-SB is the compact board with current sensing built in. Answer three questions.
| Parameter | MODB-BB | MODB-SB |
|---|---|---|
| Pack size | 6S–12S | 3S–8S (stack for more) |
| Chemistry | LiPo · LiHV · Li-ion | Li-ion · LiFePO4 |
| Pack current | Plug-on module (planned) | On board · 100 A cont. · 150 A burst |
| Balancing | ~100 mA per cell, autonomous | 62 mA, or 170 mA external option |
| Temperature inputs | 5 NTC ports + board sensors | 4 NTC + shunt sensor |
| CAN | 2 × isolated, Pixhawk JST-GH | 2 × isolated, CAN FD |
| Ship-mode draw | 2–5 µA (design estimate) | < 10 µA |
| Board size | 109 × 62 mm | 105 × 68 mm |
| Status | Rev A · Alpha build | Rev A0 · fab-ready |
| Both | DroneCAN battery messages · ArduPilot and PX4 with stock parameters · SoC, SoH and fault log on the board · hardware fault detection · no power MOSFETs | |
Works with
06 / Modular by design
Start with the base board. Add what your system needs.
The base board does the essential job and nothing else. Current sensing, a Bluetooth link and a pack switch arrive as plug-on modules, so a simple system never pays for features it does not use.
07 / Coming soon · the link layer
MODL-Core.
A compact carrier board for Microhard pMDDL IP-mesh radios. Power from the flight pack; Ethernet, USB and telemetry on Pixhawk-style connectors.
- Microhard pMDDL2450 · 2×2 MIMO · up to 1 W · 2.4 GHz
- 7–28 V input: runs straight from a 2S–6S pack
- Pico socket: swap radios between boards without soldering
08 / Who builds it
Designed by a lab that starts with the problem.
MODB and MODL each began as a problem we kept hearing from drone teams. The same six steps that produced them are how we work on yours.
How we work3
product lines in design: MODB-BB, MODB-SB, MODL-Core
±5mV
cell accuracy, monitor IC at 25 °C
0
power switches in the pack path
Contact
If you are building a drone, a battery or a machine and the power layer is in your way — write to us.
Integration questions, alpha units, configurations for your application. Tell us the system, the pack and what you need to see.
Datasheets
Preliminary documents. Figures are design targets until measured on Alpha hardware.