[Closed] Batteries for cordless drill

Main problem is you really need a battery welder to replace the tabs, these cost a few £k. Heating up a Lithium iron cell with a 100W soldering iron isn't best advised. You can get designs for home made sparc welders using a large capacitor and a 6" nail.....

Hmm, I kind of glossed over that bit... maybe this isn't as simple as I thought then

[quote=footflaps ]Main problem is you really need a battery welder to replace the tabs, these cost a few £k. Heating up a Lithium iron cell with a 100W soldering iron isn't best advised. You can get designs for home made sparc welders using a large capacitor and a 6" nail.....

Er, the ones he links to already have tags attached.

have a good shop around for prices to replace the battery packs themselves - they might be cheaper than you fear - makita li ions have pretty much halved in price over the last few years and aftermarket ones are cheaper still.

Offset that with what you can sell the jiggered packs for - there are buyers for dead battery packs on ebay - I sold a couple of dead makita packs for £15 each, so you can maybe offset the cost of new packs with the money you can make from the old one - and once you've done that the DIY approach may not seem such a bargain

the ones he links to already have tags attached.

So they do - I thought I might need to weld those together but having re-read the description I can get away with soldering.

I'll look in to that maccruiskeen - it was a cheap drill thought so I don't know whether they'll be worth anything on ebay but worth a look.

To be honest I fancied messing about with the soldering iron.

[quote=chambord ]So they do - I thought I might need to weld those together but having re-read the description I can get away with soldering.

Yep - I've made numerous battery packs by soldering together the tags on tagged cells. Fairly straightforward provided you think about how the cells will fit together before soldering (that instructable has some good hints).

Yep, I've done it too. If you have a source of cheap tagged NiCads like you do then it is easy. In the end I ended up cutting up NiCad car racing packs as a cheap source. Last time though I ended up just buying a cheap replacement pack off Amazon as it was a bit more expensive but saved a lot of hassle

Just look on ebay for replacements. Most now offer a 1 or 3 year warranty and I use the copy makita li ion batts with no faults so far and I get two for 65 quid when one official one costs 85!!!

Ive tried and seen lads on site repair the old nicad ones and some li ion packs bin replaced to a bad result!! Blown chargers or melted cells in the batts which in turn shaft the cordless item theyre being used in. Not advised tbh in my experiance.

[quote=leffeboy ]Yep, I've done it too. If you have a source of cheap tagged NiCads like you do then it is easy. In the end I ended up cutting up NiCad car racing packs as a cheap source.

I've always sourced LiIon cells from Dell batteries on ebay as they seem to be the best value and generally if buying new I've found the cells to be decent quality. Interestingly now I'm after a replacement battery for my Sony laptop I've checked and found that replacement Dell batteries of a similar spec are a lot cheaper, so I might recell the pack I already have.

Can you get a non-original battery pack on eBay? I did that for my DeWalts, quite a bit cheaper than I could even buy the cells for.

Its not advised changing cells as they can void warrantys and cause untold damage, fancy waking up to a melted lappy on the side table ??? I wouldnt trust it tbh ebay can solve these issues as mostly they can be had for 70% of oem batteries.