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diy power adapter and battery packs for cordless power tools?

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i actually had an idea of perhaps not going with lead acid batteries.. but using some of the lighter sealed batteries in a backpack with a cable coming out and going into an old battery pack thats been cleaned out to be used for a plug to the power tool.. if i was doing work all day, these batteries with 150-200ah would last all day, sure... id look like a ghostbuster, but im sure that wouldnt be any more fatiguing having larger batteries on my back than it is to have a smaller one on the end of my arm (leverage and all that)

im looking at one of the low profile battery packs now, i could easily reuse the locking mechanism and rail to slide into the base of the power tool, drill a hole in the base of the battery, mount a rubber boot in there to protect the power cable and have a large gauge power cable coming out of it

as for the possibility of a power supply... these power tools are 18v at a maximum of what? 20 amps?... under 400 watts of power... a PC power supply puts out this and much higher wattage on 12v which means it needs to run at higher amps... so i was thinking of gutting the chassy for a PC power supply and building inside this an 18v 20-30 amp power supply... and looking at the size of PC power supplies and the size of the XC batteries from milwaukee, i could probably put the guts of the power supply into the shell of the larger battery... 110v @ 5 amps in, 18v at 20 amps out

so these ideas are quite plausible... in fact, with the battery pack on your back, you wouldnt even need to go that extreme, a 20ah pack on your belt would be absolutely enormous and last all day... and i think these power drill manufacturers should be considering belt and back mounted options
 
Years go when battery drills first came out & were quite expensive I bought the cheapest I could afford but the battery was krap. the price of a new battery was more than what I paid for the whole kit. I modified it to run off a 12v 7Ah lead acid alarm battery that was in a shoulder pouch & I'm still using it 12 years later. I have a never ending supply of used but still useable alarm batteries

sorry MrAl, I didn't see your post
 
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Hi Ross,

Hey no problem. It's nice to see other people doing this too. It works great doesnt it? That's the only way i run my drill now. Iv'e given up on the sub C NiCd's because they always fail at some point. Yeah it might be a few years, but that's not enough for the cost of the batteries especially if you get good ones. The last set i bought exceeded their capacity ratings and i was surprised about that, but still only lasted 5 years. That's better than 6 months but still not enough. I used a very sophisticated charging algorithm too but still only 5 years. I got 10 years from one of my lead acid batteries.
 
I've considered switching to Duracell rechargeable batteries in my Craftsman and Delta cordless tools. The packs are rebuildable and can be serviced locally.
I've had one charging supply that recharged a cordless pack until the thermistor got warm and the charge rate disappeared. The thermistor was replaced, and all is well now.
 
12, 13.2 & 14.4 -- the best

Built both AC @ 20 amp supplies & pigtail taps to lead acid batteries. "Portable" is overrated, toteable is a workable compromise. An 8' cable is usually close enough.

Mfgr batteries are another version of the Gillette marketing model... give away the razor, profit on the blades. See inkjet printers, cellphones ..... welcome to 2010+ marketing.

The whole 18+volt (especially Lithium) powered tools movement makes this a lot more difficult. I'll just rebuild mine when they poo. G.H. <<<)))
 
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