In this article you will find step-by-step instructions on how to build a battery charger from wood scraps that will allow you to charge a NiCd (ni'-cad) cordless drill battery.
** WARNING ** only NiCd (Nickel Cadmium) batteries may be charged using this method. The pack type is usually written on them. Many newer drills use other types of batteries (Li-Ion, NiMh) that WILL EXPLODE IF YOU USE THIS PROCEDURE. If you are unsure, do not attempt this instructable. Also, improper construction or calculation of component values can cause the batteries to CATCH FIRE or EXPLODE.

Step 1: Cut two wooden blocks to hold the battery pack in place.

First measure the thickness of the stem on the battery pack and rip two wooden blocks to the same thickness. Then, make a v shaped groove to accept the rounded part of the battery pack. Make the second block with grooves to accept any keying bosses (ribs) the manufacturer may have added to the pack. I found it was easy to press the wood hard against the battery pack and use the dents as a guide for putting the slots in with my table saw. The two block can then be held in place and traced on a thin piece of wood that will become the side. Screw the side to the two blocks and test fit them.
<p>Hello, I am surprised and delighted to find a forum where<br>cordless drill chargers (which have stopped working ), are discussed and<br>possibly resurrected! I have such a problem with a DRAPER REDLINE 18-volt cordless<br>drill driver. I have tried to get information from Draper&rsquo;s technical team but<br>they were totally useless. </p><p>The Transformer pack (working) says it delivers 17watts, up<br>to 400mA DC at 23Volts. (But my open- circuit EMF measurement was 29.5V). The<br>Transformer output mini jack plug connects to the Battery through a 17watt Base<br>Unit, which fastens onto the top of the battery during charging. </p><p>The Base Unit has a small printed circuit board containing a<br>Rectifying Diode (my assumed resistance for this was 13Ω) and a Main Resistor (BURNED<br>OUT) in series. The resistor is a now dead short and the colour coding cannot<br>be distinguished, presumably due to its having been &ldquo;fried&rdquo;. All the colour<br>bands look black).In parallel with the<br>Main Resistor is a small resistor (measured at 157Ω, in series with a red LED, for<br>which my assumed resistance is 13 Ω, although that intuitively sounds high, to<br>me). The Battery unit appears almost completely &lsquo;flat&rsquo;, with only a few volts EMF.<br>According to wording on the Base Unit<br>its output voltage (to battery) should be 23volts, rated at 17watts. </p><p>I have been trying (by means of an Excel spreadsheet) to investigate<br>and estimate the value of the Main Resistor, by assuming the battery EMF of 18V<br>opposes the Input EMF of 30V, leaving a net EMF of 12V, to achieve the 23V output<br>(to battery) and a charging current of less than 400mA. But without any<br>realistic knowledge of the Battery internal resistance, the LED resistance, and<br>the Diode resistance, I am rather in the dark. My simple Ohms Law calculations,<br>lead me to a Main current &ndash;limiting Resistor of 100Ω , with a battery internal<br>resistance of 50Ω (which sounds too high to me) and a charging current of only<br>95mA.</p><p>Does anyone have knowledge of this type of charger circuit and<br>the resistance (and wattage) to use to replace the burned out main resistor? I<br>could send an email with photos of the circuit board and my derived circuit<br>diagram, to anyone who might be able to help but will try to attach these here. </p>
<p>This is not a nonsense like <a href="/member/ΧωρίςΌ" rel="nofollow">&Chi;&omega;&rho;ί&sigmaf;Ό</a> want us to think... Overnight charging is the cheapest way to charge a nickel cadmium battery (YES ONLY Ni-Cd like the author say), and is performed charging at C/10 (10% of the rated capacity per hour) for 16 hours.. So a 1000 mAH battery would be charged at 100 mA for 16 hours. This method does not require an end-of-charge sensor and ensures a full charge. Cells can be charged at this rate no matter what the initial state of charge is. </p><p>Also another fact, the volts the author use are also safe as the minimum voltage you need to get a full charge varies with temperature (at least 1.41 volts per cell at 20 degrees C). </p><p>Finally, the best charging practice is to use a timer to prevent overcharging to continue past 16 hours, so if anyone has the expertise, can make a circuit to do this (or use arduino). I will try to make a circuit capeable of reading the third connector on the battery pack, that is a thermistor, so if the battery pack gets too hot, the charger can cut-off the charge.</p><p>Also, i will post pictures later, because my fast-charger was water damaged, so i will remove almost all components from it's pcb and replace them with a circuit like the described in the tutorial... also i will keep the fan inside the charger, so i be transforming the fast charger into an overnight charger, but will fit perfectly.</p>
Hello, I just opened up the charger for my Skil screwdriver, the battery is 14.4V and 1.2 Ah .<br>The charger is powered by a 18 V AC 500 mAh transformer ... The big resistance is around 13 ohms, the circuit has the diode and the led and 2 small resistors but also a transistor connected somehow to the led !<br>I measured the voltage at the battery terminal and it is only 5 V C what should I replace in order to repair it?
<p>OK, I know the guidelines about posting say to be nice positive and constructive. But it makes no mention about people who post stupid (to the point of being dangerous) hacks of something that can be made the RIGHT way or even purchased at a comparable cost without risking anybody's safety.</p><p>The giveaway is the beginning sentence: &quot;In this article you will find step-by-step instructions on how to build a battery charger from wood scraps that will allow you to charge a NiCd (ni'-cad) cordless drill battery&quot;.</p><p>So you are making a charger out of wood scraps, right? How idiotic is this: You are using wood scraps making an improper HOLDER for an improperly constructed makeshift charger.</p><p>If you had half the brain of a sheep you'd already know that a charging circuit is a lot more than a few resistors and capacitors thrown together and that a properly build charger must have some sort of overcharging protection in the circuit, either thermal or electrical or, better, both. This means that a circuit must be smart enough to either sense the electricity flowing into the battery and cut off power when due to increasing internal resistance (as battery reaches full capacity) the battery resists more charging, hence the overheating. Or have a thermal sensor which will sense that overheating and cut off power. OR in reality, have both which is how these chargers are built.</p><p>But you also say a lot more (very dangerous) nonsense on which you're basing your calculations, i.e. a fully CHARGED NiCD cell does not have 1.2V NOMINAL charge, but a lot more. Have you ever charged a cell like that and checked its voltage? It is going to be as high as 1.42V for a new cell to as low as in the mid 1.30s V for a more used one. Spent cells (e.g. that do not hold charge anymore barely go over 1.3V usually 1.28 V) Also a completely empty cell that is allowed to reach as low as 0.8V (as you say) will have probably sustained enough damage to not be useable any more. Typically, these cells should NOT be left to go below 1.0V, that is why it is not a good idea to keep using your power drill if the battery shows signs of slowing down. That is why most manufacturers suggest to put the battery back to the charger once you are not able to do the job as you would normally could, using a freshly charged battery.</p><p>So please people DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME! &Iota;t may have worked (actually we do not know that 100%) for this guy but it may not work for you especially if you are not very savvy with electricity. Indeed you are risking the danger of fire, which is actually one of the few if not the ONLY correct thing I read in this article! (lol)</p><p>One last note to INSTRUCTABLES: Should n't you guys have some kind of moderation? Someone should verify what every one is posting on your site as &quot;instructable&quot; BEFORE it is actually posted? The usual disclaimer &quot;do it at your own risk&quot; is not good enough, don't you think?</p><p>PS: And before anyone starts complaining, I tried to be as nice as I could. But as you all know stupidity is invincible, right?</p>
<p>If that's as nice as you could, you really aren't making anything like a reasonable effort.</p>
billrule: Yes, there was a high &quot;eh&quot; factor on this build. :)
Yes, wood is a terrible material to build a charger from. I totally agree with that. However, all the whiz bang features you speak of are all comminly missing from all but the most sophisticated of chargers for NiCads. The risk of fire that the thermistors protect against are for rapid chargers, not 1/10th C or equivalent. Lithium ion chargers need that also. This in neither a lithium, nor a high current charger. The voltage cutoff of 0.8V under load is a manufacturer recommended cutoff. The 1.2V is also nominal under load. The tapering effect of the resistor takes this, and the higher voltages into account. Pakcs bursting into flames take more current than 1/10C. A short in the wiring causing the pack to short or the resistor overheating in this design is probably the largest concern. A fuse rated near the continuous charge average current should also probably be added in series with the pack. That fuse would blow if the pack were SEVERELY under voltage or if there was a wiring fault. Thanks for the safety recommendation; however you may wish to spend as much time in circuit analysis and fact checking as polishing your insults.
<p>I've got a Mastercraft drill (model 54-2973-4) that uses an 18V battery pack and the charger circuit doesn't work (charge rate controlling resistor blew, R1 in the schematic in the instruction) and I don't know what resistor value I need to put in. The thing is, the battery doesn't say the mAh value so I can't determine the resistor value I need. If it helps, the battery has the number 54-2751-2. </p><p>So my question is: how do I fix the circuit?</p><p>As well, are you doubling the charging rate for AC chargers because no current flows to the battery for half the time (during the negative AC phase)?</p>
Hi belau,<br> You can probably use many internet sources to estimate the capacity of the batteries just by their physical size. When in doubt, underestimate the capacity. If you are in doubt on the battery chemistry (i.e. not sure if it is a NiCad) STOP. Just buy another one. Don't risk it. You are absolutely correct that during 1/2 the AC cycle there is no current flow, and so we are able to use twice as large a resistor compared to DC based chargers.
and by &quot;large&quot; resistor, I meant current. The resistor is 1/2 the value in ohms, but 2x the current.
<p>Can you make a battery pack holder that runs a 12v motor?</p>
Hi! <br>I have made a 15v 13ah li-ion battery pack from laptop battery's and I was wondering if it is possible to make a charger for that battery pack. I appreciate any type of information you could give me
Hi rhman96: Lithium battery packs are NOT SAFE to charge using the method documented here. They should have individual cell over-voltage protection, temperature monitoring, and a crowbar circuit that blows the fuse if a fault is detected during charging. The reason for this is that a single weak cell can look like an undercharged pack, so the charger can keep pushing current in. Excess charge into a lithium pack causes them to catch fire in a spectacular way. With enough persistence, I am sure you could learn about all the chips and calculations required to do it safely, but PLEASE do not use my circuit to do it.
<p>i have faound a charger that is suposed to work for 14v li ion battery packs. this is what the description says about it </p><p>&quot;Charger for 14.4V and 14,8V, Li-ion battery packs This indoor charger is designed to charge 14,4V and 14,8V, Li-ion battery packs. It works on all power between 85V and 264V (no voltage adjustment is needed). Charging light: 1. The lamp lights green when the charger is ready to use. 2. The lamp lights red when charging is in progress. 3. When your battery pack is almost fully charged, the light is orange. 4. When your battery pack is fully charged, the light turns green. Features: &bull; Automatic voltage adjustment &bull; Constant voltage with constant current Product Specifications: Input: AC 85V-264V, 47Hz-63Hz Output: DC 16,6V-17V Charging current: 1,0A (Max.) Charging temperature: + 5 &deg; C ~ + 45 &deg; C Charging Humidity: 30% ~ 90%&quot;<br>do you think this will work if i just conect it to my battery pack ?</p>
<p>thanks yeltrow. i'm considering building a battery charger for a cosplay sword that illuminates. i was debating if making it rechargeable would make it more sales friendly if i decided to make a bunch of them and put them on ebay. this tutorial was a great start for me.</p><p>and thanks again for handling that &Chi;&omega;&rho;ί&sigmaf;Ό situation with such class. why he came in so offended and responded like he was The Superior Spider-man i have no clue. even if he found your tutorial lacking there are so many more positive methods to address it.</p>
<p>Like the previous post pointed out -- A fuse directly at the battery clips should be added. The biggest concern with this design isn't really the charger putting excessive current INTO the battery, it is the potential for something to touch and short circuit. The current that could come OUT of the battery would be extreme and could cause a fire. Playing with electricity is always taking on risk -- one just needs to understand the risks and make choices on how to mitigate those risks. This class of charger is NOT the best for the long term health of one's batteries. A timer to cut off the current after a full charge (i.e. 24 hours or so) or a some other means of not putting charge in when none is needed will add to the total number of cycles one can get before the batteries wear out. I think I remember seeing that trickle chargers cut the total number of cycles one can get out of a battery by perhaps 30%; however not having a charger of any sort reduces the number one can get by 100% :) Note that the manufacturers don't really care if you get 5 years out of your packs and so they don't bother. They plan on making more money off new batteries or selling more drills. My electric razor has rechargeable NiCad batteries in it, and the stock charger has kept them in good health for 15 years!</p>
<p>Can I charge a 12V battery from a power tool with a charger from another power tool that is 9.5V? Obviously it won't fit on the charger base but I am intended to use a pair of cables to attached the terminals from the charger to the batteries posts (+ &amp; -). Thanks in advace. Carlos carlosfn@gmail.com</p>
Hello <br>I really appreciated your posting. I was trying to repair a 19V hand held vac. I had replaced the batteries in the unit (15 C cells) After replacing the batteries, I noticed that one of the resisters had overheated and the charging LED had burned out. Using your description I installed a 800ohm resistor to protect a new LED and an 82ohm 2 watt resister to limit the charging current. This wasn't exactly what your calculations came up with but seemed to be close enough. I am using a 120Vac to 24Vdc 20mA wall charger. <br>Take Care
hi, <br>this is really nice...but what to do if the battery goes down..then how to replace it. and if the battery is down then what should we do?? we use the cordless for our The Trendy Style <a href="http://www.thetrendystyle.com" rel="nofollow" title="Pakistani Indian Western wear Dresses">Dress Shop</a> <br>
I know I can build this if someone can help me with the math. I need to build a charger for my 18V Skil ni-cad battery packs. I've had a couple of battery packs die and wanted to take the opportunity to upgrade. The orignal packs were 1300 ah but I plan to buy 1800 ah cells to rebuild them. Would also be nice to build the charger so it can recharge two batteries at the same time.<br>
i tried to figure this out on my own, but i just couldn't get an answer that made sense, so i'm just going to ask. i brought an 18V Royobi tool set home to thailand last year. i bought a 220V --&gt; 110V transformer (stepdown) to plug the charger into. my wife, helpfully plugged the charger into the wall, without the step down transformer. POOF! blew the transformer in the charger. i looked up the transformer in the unit. it specs out as 20.5 VAC 1900 mA on the secondary side. but up here in farm country, i could only find a multi-tap transformer (220V on the primary side of course) that has 9, 12, 18 and 24 V taps on the secondary side. bigger than the Royobi transformer, so i think it will handle the power, but what can i do about the 3.5 Volts higher output than the original one supplied?<br><br>is there a way to &quot;dump&quot; or use up the extra voltage so i can use it in my charger? like with some resistors or something? if i can't get it fixed, i have to buy another drill, and i really liked my Roybi cordless. thanks anyone!
I have a 24v 6amp saw that lost its charger, so I definitely need to try this project. <br>Thank for your instructable.<br>I figure I can just double your numbers to achieve a safe charge?<br>Is there any truth to the idea that slower charging will extend the life of Nicad batteries over speed charging them? This has been my experience, and I would like some feedback.
Just doubling the number might not be safe, so be sure to check out the battery specs and run your own calculations. Pick a charger that is 36V or higher and then run the calculations. Also, it will matter if you have an AC or a DC output AC adapter. The power dissipation on the resistors and the maximum charge rate are the most important numbers. Too much power eaten up across too few resistors = fire. Too much charge current on the pack = fire. <br>Please be careful and test your circuit on a non-flammable surface for while.
Thankyou @yeltrow<br><br>Your instructable helped me find out a charred resistor value on my B&amp;D Firestorm Drill 14.4v battery charger. The battery is Black &amp; Decker FSB14 FireStorm 14.4-Volt NiCad Slide Style Battery.<br><br>Here are my calculations which fixed my charger. I used /10 to match original charger circuit. Wall wart is rated 17.4V / 210 mA. I suppose it was designed to fully charge a pack in 10 hours.<br><br>2.0 Ah capacity / 10 (dc supply) = 0.2A charge rate<br>17.4V charger &ndash; 14.4V battery = 3V difference<br>3V/0.2A charge rate = 15 ohms<br>3V*0.2A = 0.6Watt of heat<br>0.6 watts / 1 ( dc xformer) = 0.6 watts or 600mW. <br><br>Some faulty cells in one of my battery pack caused the charger malfunction. So I am now keeping an eye on battery volts when charging the pack. I disconnect the charger when meter reads about 17.4 volts (1.45 max per cell x 12 = 17.4).
You are welcome! I was reviewing your comments and it's a nice case study. I was thinking after reading it that it is also important to consider the case of a fully discharged pack when determining how many resistors to use to handle the heat. The voltage across a fully discharged pack is 0.8V per cell times the number in the pack. In your case, you have 12 cells. 12 x 0.8V per cell is 9.6V. 17.4V - 9.6V = 7.8V. (7.8V of difference)/(0.2A of Capacity/10) = 39 ohms of resistance. 0.2A * 7.8V = 1.56W. To safely dissipate the 1.56W, I would recommend splitting the 39 Ohms across 7 or more Two of the 5 packs of 0.25W resistors all wired in parallel would be 47Ohms, which would extend the charge time a little but have 2.5W of heat dissipation capacity and would be a safe bet. The other standard value that would work okay would be to get a 5 pack of 0.5W 220 Ohm resistors and wire them all in parallel for 44Ohms and also 2.5 of heat dissipating capability. Again, a little slower charging, but capable of safely dissipating the heat. Thank you for the detailed discussion of your application -- It really helped me think through this instructable after not having looked at it for a while.
Using a Makita 6260D (9.6V drill) the voltage generated does not exceed 1 Volt :-( Using another Makita 10.8 Volts (normally powered with Li-ION battery) does not rotate at all even wqhen holding the switch down. It seems it bloks when no power is applied.
Does the LED stop glowing when the battery is fully charged?
The LED will stay illuminated. Most of the 1/16th C still will flow through the battery even after being fully charged. It will be reduced slightly because the voltage of the 12V pack will be a little higher than 12V when it is completely topped off; however, it will still not be high enough to prevent all current from flowing. Although it is common practice to trickle charge NiCd batteries forever, it is best to take the battery out after 16 or 20 hours.
1/16th C charge rate (capacity divided by 16) when you say capacity are you referring to the battery per say 2000 Ah trying to figure out the math on this why do you divide by 16 thanks
will41, thank you for your interest in my article. If you look at the datasheet for many NiCd batteries, they suggest that no more than 1/10th of the capacity be charged in an hour if you are going to let it cook on a "dumb" charger (which this instructable is). The most conservative specs recommend 1/16th of the capacity be charged in an hour. 1/16th C is a relatively gentle continuous charge rate, so that is why I selected it. Also, the resistors get hotter the harder you drive the charger, so it keeps those running in a safe range as well. As a side note, the wall transformer for my original Ryobi charger is 20VDC, so it appears my choice of an 18VAC transformer wasn't a bad one at all. You may want to find one with about 8 volts of overhead too.
i have the math figured out now,little confused on the wiring i cant makeout the picture which wire is wired to the resitors and which are wired to the led which side is positive and negative can you help me out thanks
<br/>will41,<br/> The battery should tell you how many mAh (milliamp hours) the battery has at full capacity. This is how long the battery will run for if you were to discharge it at a given current draw. This is the capacity or &quot;C&quot; I speak of in the article that I divide by 16. For example: 1400mAh means you get 1.4A=1400mA for 1 hour, or about 700mA=0.7A for 2 hours, etc. The mAh are measured under ideal conditions, and generally decrease by as much as 50% or more if you discharge the battery at a high rate. Aslo, while you are reading the battery * MAKE SURE IT IS A NiCd BATTERY * or you may well BLOW IT UP OR BURN DOWN YOUR HOME. You did not state if your wall transformer is 24V AC or DC. It will also say this on the transformer. Please use the schematic to figure out how to wire this up -- the photo is just an example. The symbols can be looked up on the web. You may want to check out the wikipedia pages for Diode, LED, Resistor, and Ohm's law for details on what each of the parts do to get a clearer understanding of how they work together.<br/>
Not only a good idea for a battery charger. Also a good idea for a battery holder to power other projects.

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