Keep your Reciepts!

[Propforward]

So.....a couple of years ago I purchased a new cordless drill. A ridgid 18V. I bought it because we have one at work, and I liked it, so thought I would get the same one.

I drilled many holes in many things (some of which I later wished I hadn't). I liked this drill.

2 years later - I am attempting to build a set of rugged shelves for holding lathe tooling and raw material. The batteries are dead - they won't drill more than 3 holes or put one screw in a piece of lumber before dying.

:rant:

So, I start researching the cost of replacement batteries. Naturally what do I find? I can buy a whole new cordless drill, with a carrying case, and a cordless impact wrench and two batteries for 10 dollars more than the cost of replacing 2 batteries.

In short, replacing the batteries is expensive. I don't NEED a new cordless drill, and I don't need a cordless impact wrench.

:rant:

So I turn to the interwebz, like you do, and do some searching. I doscover various things about places to repair the batteries, and sources for the LiIon cells so that I can possibly repair them myself.

But then I happen upon a little nugget. Ridgid power tools have a 3 year warranty - including the batteries.

All you need to do is take the tool and the original receipt to an authorised service center.

:wall:


But.....I am the kind of guy that keeps receipts for a long time. A little bit of searching around and I turn up my receipt from 2 years ago!

Off down the service center, lo and behold, no problem. Ridgid ships me two brand new batteries free of charge!

So the moral is - keep your receipts for your stuff. Some warranties are really good - I was surprised to see a 3 year warranty on battery packs, but it does explain the very high replacement price.

Thm:

I expect I'm preaching to the converted here.

 

[Tin Falcon]

Nice tip. I have to replace my dewalt batteries. My DD is 11 years old and my sons is about 8 TO and the batters are failing .

the nice thing is I can get assembled in USA replacement packs for my sons batteries for about half the cost of new batteries. so helps some. take out a couple screws pull out the guts and install the new inards. and away we go for another 5-10 years. by then may be time for a new drill.
Tin

 

[Beachside_Hank]

Since I no longer make house calls- retired furniture/ cabinetmaker- as my battery powered tools go belly up, I just replace with corded. Not many issues with power source at all, especially not the battery pack ripoffs.

 

[Propforward]

Good points. I also discovered that Batteries Plus can rebuild most battery packs for significantly less than the price of new ones, so something to bear in mind.

 

[Propforward]

It really bugs me that I spelled "Receipt" incorrectly on the title of this thread.

 

[dman]

i don't know what the trend is in radio control right now but about 8 years ago i remember batteries getting very cheap and the cells were available to assemble your own packs. they also sold the copper strips to solder it all together. but as i understand it now they are all using li-poly batteries for airplanes and maybe li-Ion for surface vehicles. which would be good for a diy rebuild of your packs but i don't know if the batteries are still affordable or available in kit form.

 

[Propforward]

I understand that it is quite simple to get the individual cells for these batteries, I was going to locate the source (you can probably get them from batteries plus), but I stopped looking for the source when I discovered the warranty part.

Part of the problem with these battery packs when purchased, is that you are not just buying a bunch of Li Ion cells in a box, there is also a circuit board in the battery pack, which controls the discharge of the battery. ie it prevents you discharging the battery too much - as that is instant death for a Li ion battery. That is why your cordless tools now suddenly stop, rather than starting to wind down. So - basically when buying a totally new battery pack, you have to buy all the moulding and control circuitry, and also pay for the warranty - that is the batteries are priced to allow the tool maker to be profitable even with high battery failure rate. I understand these battery failures are "not uncommon". The guy at the service center made sure to tell me to "hang on to that receipt for another year".

 

[purpleknif]

We've gone to li-po's in rc. Way cheaper and way more run time. Used to pay around $60 for a 4-cell pack (racing grade) and you would need 4 packs to run 4 heats. With the li po's we can run all night on one $5 battery..

 

[Cogsy]

It's a great tip to keep your receipts (I trust my better half to take care of that) but I recommend actually seeking out and reading the warranty BEFORE you buy something pricey. My chinese lathe started to develop an issue 2 months after I bought it, brand new from a supposedly reputable seller here in Oz, and I couldn't find any warranty info at all with my paperwork. So I contacted the 'reputable seller' and they tell me their warranty is 30 days - on a $850 item!

I'm in dispute with them still and I'm hoping for the best, but I wish I'd researched a bit better before parting with my hard earned $.

 

[Propforward]

I recommend actually seeking out and reading the warranty BEFORE you buy something pricey.

That is definitely a better approach!

OUCH! 30 day warranty on a high ticket item? Now that sucks.

 

[petertha]

We've gone to li-po's in rc. ..

Exactly what I was going to say. Ive soldered more NicD & NimH packs in different configurations for competition that I care to admit. Lithium polymer are so inexpensive & offer energy density we could only dream about a few years ago. Ive also retrofitted cordless drills for friends. Sometimes what I pulled out of 'namebrand' drills was a joke. You could buy a better cell with 3X the maH capacity & much higher discharge rate for 3$/cell. An 18v setup (12 cells @ 1.2v nominal) would cost 36$ in batteries; the replacement packs were going for close to $100 locally & were a fraction the quality. Cell soldering is easy for the part but where you can run into issues is the way they spot weld the charging clip harness/connector directly on teh cell vs a wire harness. I suspect that might be to make retrofits dificult. Ive made Franken-drills with Lipo packs, that wer just stuffed in the NimH pack plastic shell. But I also have the appropriate charging equipment from RC.

Now most tool packs are Lithium chemistry which are much better cells. But you have to be real careful about aftermarket Li* cells & charging. They vary by manufacturer & are fussy about their charging algorithms. If they catch fire, it isn't pretty.

 

[sunworksco]

The best alternative when replacing old ni-cad batteries is to use nickel metal hydride batteries. There is no need for a special cell balancing charger and they are much more powerful than the ni-cads. There are companies that can convert your existing battery case or convert them yourself.