Can you Help me with this Repair ??

[upmm019]

Hi,

I'm hoping that someone or several of you will lend me some assistance regarding an item I'd like to see if it could be repaired...

It is a drill charger unit for an 18v cordless off brand (PowerGlide sold at Ace Hardware) drill.

I have three of them and they work great when the batteries can be charged but it seems the chargers are poorly made and they have a high rate of failure.

I'm hoping someone can look at the pictures I have and tell me if and where I could begin to repair it. Perhaps figure out why it failed and put a safe guard in place to prevent failure??

When it does work ... you put the battery in the charger and the LED lights up red... it blinks when the battery is charged.

I do have a cheap tester with the probes but not sure how to use it correctly.

if someone can tell me what sort of tests to run on the charger and wall transformer perhaps we can pin point the failure.

Right now the charger does not light the LED when plugged in.

Here are the pics of the set up...

**broken link removed**

**broken link removed**

**broken link removed**

**broken link removed**

**broken link removed**

**broken link removed**

 

[Chippie]

Can you post up a picture of your tester so we can see what it is?

The black 3 legged device, has it got a number on it?

It does look like it has been erased

 

[upmm019]

**broken link removed**

here is my tester.. let me check on the other thing..... will post shortly

 

[upmm019]

Here is a picture of that part you asked about...

**broken link removed**

 

[gabeNC]

That's all the electronics for the charger?????

I took apart an older Dewalt charger and It was FULL of stuff, probably for monitoring over charging and stuff like that, course the transformer was on board too.

 

[upmm019]

Yep, just that which is pictured above and the wall adapter.

 

[Chippie]

Start with the easiest bit....

Take your meter, switch it to the DC volts range, 50V ought to do it.

Plug the wal wart into a socket outlet, then take the Red meter probe and insert it into the centre of the dc plug at the end of the cable, connect the Black probe to the metal outer of the plug...

Have someone switch on the wall wart for you while you do this(unless you are an octopuss)....You should read about midscale on your meter...

Tell us what you read......

More to follow..

 

[upmm019]

It seems I get the same readings regardless if it's plugged into the wall outlet or not.

On DCV @ 50 it shows around 7

On ACV @ 50 it shows around 3

Again this is going off of my meter posted above.

 

[Chippie]

Looks like the ww has gone west....Got any other wall warts the same or similar?

Have you got access to two 12v car batteries?

You could connect the two 12v batteries in series, then connect the charger with a battery pack in it and see if the Red led comes on..

You

 

[upmm019]

I'll check...

Should the wall adapter be working correctly based upon the specs, should I have seen 22 VDC for output?

based upon that small PCB... what does it really do? Can it easily be read and put into laymans terms ?

 

[Chippie]

Yes you should see 22v from the ww when it is plugged in and switched on...but then you guys dont have switched sockets do you? (from memory I dont think so...)

You have 110volts at the socket yes?

 

[upmm019]

right, 110 wall outlets.

Just wondering what the over all PCB does....

What could lead to it's failure ..... I should point out that the charger in the pictures is brand new, had it yesterday for just a short while ... after the 1st two batteries it was fine but after the third it stopped working....

What can I do to resurrect this charger? Any thoughts, opinons, etc?

 

[Chippie]

So do you just have the one wall wart for all of these chargers?

Wall warts do fail in service...My Skil one died not so long back...If they are left charging after the battery pack is fully charged, they can and do overheat...Usually the primary fails..You can check this...Take your meter again, switch it to Ohms x10 range, range,now place the red and black probes together and the needle should go to the rightof the scale...Does it?

Now take the wall wart, make sure it is not connected to anything.

Connect the red and black probes to the two pins that would go into the wall outlet.....Does the meter read anything?

If not do the next step:
Change to the x100 range and try again...Does the meter read anything?

If not do the next step:

Change to the x1K range and try again...

Still nothing...? Bin it it's goosed.....

 

[upmm019]

Ohms x10 range - Goes to Right of Scale as you said

Now take the wall wart, make sure it is not connected to anything.

Connect the red and black probes to the two pins that would go into the wall outlet.....Does the meter read anything? No

If not do the next step:
Change to the x100 range and try again...Does the meter read anything? No

If not do the next step:

Change to the x1K range and try again... No

I tried it on another wall adapter that is not like the one for the charger but more so as a control as I know it works and the above tests showed reactions on all of the settings.

That said, it seems all three transformers I have must be shot.

Can I get a replacement that may be universal that I could use.. what leads to their failure? I know my older ones where left plugged in which probably led to a shorter lifetime but the newer one went out right away.....

 

[Chippie]

That said, it seems all three transformers I have must be shot.

Can I get a replacement that may be universal that I could use.. what leads to their failure? I know my older ones where left plugged in which probably led to a shorter lifetime but the newer one went out right away.....

I'd agree...You say the last one is new? Cant you take it back and ask for a refund if under warranty?

What you need to do is go to one of your local electronics hobby shops and seek their advice on what they stock that may be suitable..

 

[upmm019]

Yeah, I can return it...

But I suspect I'll end up with another crappy item.

Just seems it should last longer and we really cannot say for sure if the base with the PCB is working or has been damaged.

I just hate to throw these away as the drills are near new and two of the three batteries are excellent when charged.

Just wondering if there is any place online where I could get a universal charger or something on that line.... trying to think out of the box and circumvent the poor quality of this charger...

 

[Chippie]

Yeah, I can return it...



Just seems it should last longer and we really cannot say for sure if the base with the PCB is working or has been damaged.
Just wondering if there is any place online where I could get a universal charger or something on that line.... trying to think out of the box and circumvent the poor quality of this charger...

There are alternatives to this type of charger setup...
The R/C car/aircraft boys( self included) use dedicated chargers for their battery packs..Want to know more?

You could even build a charger yourself...but you still need the 'high' voltage transformer to do it....

There are always alternatives..

 

[upmm019]

Yes, please tell me.

I use to do R/C Planes but never really got that involved with the batteries that much other than using the supplied chargers.....

I'm looking for an alternative so if you may have one let me know.

 

[upmm019]

Any further suggestions would be great.

 

[upmm019]

No more takers on helping me out ??