i use mine at home, and not hard, prolly few hours every other weekend,

but dang, in 3 years, they have just gone to pooh.

i have an extra empty case, and the 2 batteries that came with my tools,

where/how should I get them repaired?

i usually put them on the charger friday nite if i want to do something saturday

 

Buy new ones?? I really don't know, but I have had the same problem. Fortunatly my drill fell from the roof one day and exploded on impact. Gave me an excuse to buy a new one...........

 

dang, they are $79 new.

i would just go buy new ones for half that, but to drop $160 on batteries that won't do any better is not me.

i wanted to ask, one guy told me to send them somewhere & get them replaced with something, but he did not know a place.

and from GOOGLE'n it, i can't tell what is good, and what is bad.

 

I've heard of something simular. Is there a tool place like Tool Mart or something like that in your area? If so, check with them.

 

A good way to keep your batteries "like new" is to completely drain them before charging. I have a Dewalt 18v drill for 5 years now and the batteries still hold a charge just like they did when I bought it. I do this with my cell phone too. My cell will hold a charge just as long as it did when I bought it. I know it can be an inconvenience, but it's better than spending $79 for a new one.

 

Often when you open one of those things up you will find cells that are commercially available... often what are called Sub-C that are either soldered in or come with welded tabs, 1.2 volts with a range of amp hour ratings.

This would be a proceed at your own risk kind of thing.

Nickel metal hydride and nickel cadmium types don't develop memory from partial discharge cycles, but like all batteries their performace degrades over time and cycles. Rechargeable alkalines do build memory. Typically rechargeable tools would run nickel metal hydride, which provide higher capacity than cadmium, but have shorter cycle life.

On E-bay there are battery rebuilder companies, and guides to replacing cells in tool batteries (but I don't know how good they are).

If you google "tool battery rebuilding" you will get a lot of hits.

 

I found new batteries listed here at Northern Tool.

http://www.northerntool.com/webapp/w...atchallpartial

 

Here's a shot of the sub-c's that were in my drill pack...



And a shot of new cells, wired the same...



Like $15 worth of batteries. Again, doing something like this would be an "at your own risk" thing, as these things have enough power to cause a fire if shorted...

Seems to run fine, and have higher capacity than it did from the factory, but I don't leave it unattended when charging.

 

Batteries Plus has replacements for about 50 bucks. I have heard they are better than the original.

 

Buy a ridgid. Lifetime warranty on batteries. Stupid of them, i know but after 4 or 6 dewalt batteries, we decided that the whole different setup would be cheaper

 

Grizzly usually has a two pack for around the cost of one 18v battery. Try www.grizzly.com. I always get them there because the price is right. I've used Dewalt cordless tools exclusively for about the last ten years and it sounds like your's are done. Time for new ones.

 

the local place in town wanted $50 each for a rebuild.

they all 3 died dead last week, I sent them in for a rebuild, and have not heard hide nor hair from the company:

18VOLT
2000MAH NICAD
$35.00

http://www.voltmanbatteries.com/batteryrebuilds.htm


Jeff, where did you get the C cells with the Tabs on them?
that was what i was afraid I could not do, solder tabs on the batteries.

i could do what you did, easy enough.

 

I have used batteries plus and bought replacements and have had them rework old batteries they work great. Rebuilds were $9 and replacements were 49.

 

batteryjunction.com. they have a good selection/prices---and you can get tabs/no tabs option

 

An e-bay seller called all-battery. I ended up with batteries with tabs because they were cheaper in the quantity I needed to repower two battery packs.

They were easy to solder to, but cutting off the excess tab (so they couldn't short) was a bit of a pain, and also the added height of the tab, solder and wire made it tough to get the case back together (but I jossled things around and got it to close).

Next time I think I'll try the plain tops, and a bit lighter wire, but like you I've never attempted to solder to them.

Not shown in the photos I posted was a temp sensor that was shrink wrapped to one of the cells. It was no big deal to tape it on to one of the new cells.

I looked at the rebuilding services, too, but they would have been like $45 per pack when you figured in shipping, which is getting too close to the price of new. This set me back about $30 to do both of them with higher capacity cells (these were ni-cad, and I stuck with ni-cad).

Jeff