De Walt battery

[Martin]

In the last 3 years (or so?) I’ve gone though 3 out of 4 NiCad (9.6v) batteries on my De Walt drill. When my 4th and final battery was loosing it staying power I decided to go back to my local tool store for a replacement.

Many of the later De Walt drills now use the more powerful and longer lasting NiMH batteries. Fortunately for me they also do a NiMH replacement battery for my drill albeit they were twice the price and needed a special one hour charger (as the NiCd charger is no good for NiMH apparently). So the new battery (£25) and the charger (£61) was a bit of a costly up-grade, but it is surely worth the investment I reckon. 🙂

What I have noticed so far is that unlike NiCd the NiMH whilst having greater power for much longer use. There is little warning of when the power runs out, one minute it is going great, then with little warning, the battery suddenly dies on you. Whereas you always knew the NiCd was running out of juice as it slowed down for quite a long period of time and was still usable during that period.

So to get my toolbox gear spot on, looks like I will have to buy yet another NiMH battery? 🙄

[electrofix]

Re: De Walt battery

one of the problems with NiCad batts is they have a memory effect
to get the best from them you must not charge them till they are flat. multiple charging from half full causes them to only give half the output and reduces useful life NiMH does not have this problem and should give a longer useful life

dave

[clivejameson]

Re: De Walt battery

Hi Martin

Why bother spending out on a new battery and charger??

http://www.screwfix.com/app/sfd/cat/pro … 3&id=81433

I used to have a 9.6v driver until the charger decided to melt itself into one of the batteries (!)

[Martin]

Re: De Walt battery

clivejameson wrote:Why bother spending out on a new battery and charger??

The Screwfix example you gave there Clive is exactly the drill I have but whilst the value for money is undeniable, I would not end up with the better deal (£ for £) 😕

What I now have is a better, more powerful, no memory effect, quicker charging, longer lasting battery option. Furthermore to beat that I would have to stump up more money AND buy a larger toolbox (‘cos other drill’s are larger and a larger drill don’t fit inside my toolbox..) 🙁

Horses for courses 😉

[clivejameson]

Re: De Walt battery

All fair comment Martin….I had my last Dewalt about 3 years before I gave up on replacing batteries and bought a new package…only then did I find out just how worn my old one was 😉

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