Replacement Batteries

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Taffy Turner

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I have the Screwfix 24V Combi Drill, which is a decent bit of kit for the money (circa £55).

HOWEVER - the batteries are absolutely cr*p!

Does anyone know if any of the reputable brands (DeWalt, Makita, Elu etc) batteries will fit this drill, and if so, where to get them?

Thanks
Gary
 
Dunno, but I'd be interested in your results. Have you tried taking the battery apart?

Adam
 
No - I was keeping that one up my sleeve as a last resort.

The batteries were OK (ish) when new, but they haven't lasted well at all.

I have always been carefull to make sure they are fully discharged before re-charging, to avoid any problems with memory effects etc.

I guess that you get what you pay for!
 
I am prepared to recomend these people http://www.strikalite.co.uk/. They supplied batterie for an old but faithfull B&D Cordless and rebuilt the charger when I blew it up due to reversing the polarity when I re-wired the batteries.


AndyP
 
Hi Taffy
The Screwfix 24v is a Ferm if I remember right. And if so has a 3 year guarantee and as I shouldn't think it could be 3 years old send it back and get a new drill and batteries.

All the Best

John
 
I agree with John but check the 'small print' of the guarantee first to make sure batteries are covered, some companies don't cover them in warranties/guarantees :wink:
 
You may want to be careful with fully discharging batteries. If they are NiCads, then you may find that there are a number of individual batteries in the box. When they approach the fully discharged state, then one will become discharged whilst the others still have some charge. This can lead to the situation where the discharged one starts to get reverse charged by the others and can totalll knacker it.
Best thing to do is to only run it down to the point where it gets close to discharged. The analogy with a torch would be when the bulb just starts to dim. Do that and you should get a lot better life out of them.
I also seem to remember reading an article that said that there is no such thing as the memory effect anymore. I shall have to see if I can find it again.

Cheers,
Barry
 
The manufactures dispute the existance of memory effectin NiCADs, but it is still there and is largly due to poor charging by the chargers supplied.
I know of a firm in Leicestershire who rebuild NiCADS and will supply the parts in kit form for DIY. I have one just in case.

Bean
 
DAG on "memory effect".
Seems to bear out what I thought about it also on the discharging thing.
Basically, completely discharging your batteries is a no-no. You are better off re-charging a partially discharged battery. I have always recharged my DeWalt pack when the drill starts to slow thus indicating that it is approaching discharged state. The batteries have lasted for a good few years now and are as good as when I bought it.
I also have a battery pack for a caving headlamp that has lasted for about ten years now. Been used for thousands of hours and probably recharged thousands of times, but never fully discharged. Always recharged to full no matter how much charge was remaining and still gives the full ten hours duration.

Try:

http://www.dansdata.com/gz011.htm
http://www.repairfaq.org/ELE/F_NiCd_Memory.html
http://www.zbattery.com/zbattery/memoryeffect.html

But there again, the second link to come up thinks it does exist:
http://www.batterybank.com/page18.html

Cheers,
Barry
 
True that a while back NICADs displayed memory effect but modern cells do not and will be fine with a decent charger. I would expect cheaper drills to use pretty rudimentary chargers which may over-charge and damage cells.

NIMH has higher energy density and is much better if you can find a drill with 'em - much raved about Panasonic uses NIMH

Lithium Ion are even bettwer with greater energy density (used in most decent laptops) but I haven't seen a dril lusing them yet as they are expensive £££££

If you take the battery pack apart, you will find a number of small, standard sized cells which can be purchased individually from Maplins, RS, Farnell etc.

Cheers

Tony
 
Talking about batteries:

My first cordless drill was a Bosch 9.6v bought about 8-9 years ago. It served me well but of course a few years back the battery lost its oomph so to speak.

To replace the battery at the time was on a par to buying a new drill even of a higher spec.

No argument there then; bought a new drill.

The old bosch 9.6v sits in the workshop now, quite forlorn in its idleness.

What joy then to read in this months edition of GW in the 'letters' section page 12 ( first letter) from a David Fraser that he can get a replacement Bosch 12v battery for £14.99.

Since the cheapest I have ever seen is a rebuild @ £26.00 ( excluding carriage) and this only in a link in this thread ( the cheapest previous was about £40) how disappointed I then became when the location of such a great deal was not included in David's letter.

So, if you are out there David, or if anyone knows David or indeed where he gets his excellently priced Bosch drill batteries please let us all into the location.

I am sure that I am not the only one with an otherwise excellent cordless drill idle for lack of a decent priced battery.

Cheers :)

Billzee
 
I am sure that I am not the only one with an otherwise excellent cordless drill idle for lack of a decent priced battery.

Oh well, maybe I am :shock:
 
Hi Billzee

If we took the excellent out of your statement :shock:
Then I will stand up to be counted :(
The amount of rubbish I have got laying around is unbelievable :oops:

All the best

John
 
The description of 'excellent' that was included, is somewhat 'Poetically Licensed', memories being what they are; furthermore the dearth of replies engendered by my enquiry would signify apparently that a cheap supply of Bosch batteries is only something that you can read about in letter pages rather than find in the 'real world'. :(

Ahh, fiction has uses as also do hopes, the both of which I love
That the latter be indulged when ever I wish, the former as mentioned above

:wink:
 
Billzee,

You may or may not believe this, but my dad's just this moment been moaning to me about his (wait for it) Bosch 9.6v drill not taking a charge any more, so he'd be interested. :D

Cheers, Alf
 
furthermore the dearth of replies engendered by my enquiry would signify apparently that a cheap supply of Bosch batteries is only something that you can read about in Good Woodworking letter pages rather than find in the 'real world'.

We've attempted to contact the reader who wrote to GW regarding cheap Bosch batteries, but have not yet had a reply from him.
 
Alf, for your dads interest and any other Bosch fan I rang GW last week to enquire if they had a contact addy for the author of the letter David Fraser.

I was told that probably not but they would look into it. I will be ringing them soon to find out.

Incidently, I spoke to Pete Martin.

cheers

Billzee
 

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