Cordless drill batteries going flat

Is that with the battery plugged into the drill OR is it when they are by themselves?
If it isn't a well known expensive brand the batteries may be fairly poor at holding charge.

If when in the drill and it has an inbuilt light that may be dragging power "unseen"

If it is any of the Supercheap, Aldi or low end trade store drills don't expect too much.

Ross M

Nickle cad & nickle metal hydride batteries do not hold there charge for a long time, as they age this gets worse.....don't expect to charge a NiCad and have a full charge 2 weeks later.

NiCad & NiMh batteries like it cold, they are most efficient arround 0C , the hotter they get, the less charge will stick the shorter their life, the less charge you will get out and the worse their self discharge will be.

NiMh has less problems and all to a lesser degree that NiCad.

Neither like to sit and do nothing for long periods, if left in storage both may take a couple of cycles to return to their best.

NiCad, does tend to suffer from discharge memory......they like to be fully cycled reasonable regularly and they rersent being short charged.

When I was using NiCad battery drills regularly, about once every couple of months, I would I would tape up a drill and let the battery run till it nearly stopped.....let the battery cool then recharge.

ALLways, let the battery cool before recharging.

You will get more change to stick to a NiCad, by charging it in the fridge, because charging is ended bassed on temperature.....a cool battery is a happy battery.

Putting nicad batteries in the deep freeze over night is proven to liven up sad batteries, and tends to break up metal creep and helps with discharge memory.
I have done it myself and yes it works.....like all things there are limits.

Put said battery into a zip lock baggie with the air squeezed out and put it in the deep freeze over night, allow it to warm up and recharge.

Aftermarket battery packs and repacks almost without exception go better than factory.

When buying replecement packs or cells.....look for SANYO cells used in the packs......they have had the fast charge and power tool NiCad technologies by the balls for ages...no one can touch em in this particular application.

In Australia, master instruments have the best and widest range of replecement packs.
They use batch matched Sanyo cells in most of their packs.
Ask for them at any decent battery shop or power tool shop.

cheers

Some of my Bosch batteries are getting old and not holding charge so I tried masters instruments they told me they don't sell to the public you need an abn number. Plus they are dearer than a company in the USA I have used before I think I buy from them again.