Author Topic: Cordless power-tool battery repair  (Read 5673 times)

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Offline LiteaceTopic starter

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Cordless power-tool battery repair
« on: November 17, 2018, 09:17:14 pm »
Could someone please help me find the problem with my 20 volt cordless impact gun battery. I went to use the gun, checked battery charge with green led/s on battery, it was low only one led lit out the 4 but Ive used it before like this no problem, it worked for split second then stopped, checked charge again, no leds lit, put battery in charger and got red error light lit on charger.

I have pulled battery apart to check, can't see anything out the ordinary nothing burnt or loose.

I have checked the power on b+ and B- and got 18.5 volts, I dont know what / where to check next





« Last Edit: November 17, 2018, 09:18:54 pm by Liteace »
 

Offline Gyro

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #1 on: November 17, 2018, 09:29:04 pm »
I suspect that you may have over-discharged one of the cells and the protection has kicked in. Before messing with anything I'd be tempted to leave it a day or so for the voltages to recover and try it in the charger again. Repeated insertions into the charger may 'pulse' it enough to start charging normally.
Best Regards, Chris
 
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Offline LiteaceTopic starter

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #2 on: November 17, 2018, 09:34:29 pm »
Thanks for the rapid reply, Ive tried to charge it several times over the last week at various different temperatures and still the same problem, the charge % indicator on the battery does nothing and still get red led lit on charger
 

Offline Gyro

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #3 on: November 17, 2018, 09:41:51 pm »
Oh well, it was worth a try.

The first step in that case might be to measure the voltage of each individual cell (assuming that you can get to the ends) to see if there's any legitimate reason for the error signal. I know that some laptop batteries can go into permanent lockout if a problem is detected. Hopefully not the case with power tool packs.
Best Regards, Chris
 
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Offline drussell

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #4 on: November 17, 2018, 09:43:20 pm »
What is the actual voltage across each of the individual cells currently measuring?

Can you actually draw any current out of the B+/B- terminals?  Probably not.
 
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Offline commongrounder

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #5 on: November 17, 2018, 09:59:09 pm »
How long has this pack been in service?  If it has been in steady use for a couple of years, it’s likely one or more of the cells in the pack have failed.  They can do that suddenly. In that case, either have the pack rebuilt, or replace it.
 
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Offline LiteaceTopic starter

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #6 on: November 17, 2018, 10:28:36 pm »
The gun and battery have been in very light service for a couple of years always kept in a cool place and well looked after

I can draw / power up a small PC cooling fan from the B- & B+, Ive got nothing to hand that will draw more

Here's what Ive got at each cell, I assume the 4.0ish volts is because the way the cells have been wired



 

Offline Gyro

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #7 on: November 17, 2018, 10:42:28 pm »
2.3V definitely isn't health for a Lithium cell (it's 2 in parallel), there's the source of your problem.

Power tools do push them pretty hard - I noted the 60A fuse on the board! It looks as if the pack has voltage balancing and monitoring but the cutout obviously didn't work fast enough when trying to use a discharged pack.

I'm just tentatively wondering whether I would risk very gently trickle charging those two cells back into normal voltage range so that the charger can take over (afterwards). There are possible serious consequences, such as balls of flame! On the other hand it might recover the pack, the voltage balancing probably improves the odds slightly.

I'd wait for a few other opinions on this.



P.S. Don't try to draw any more power from it!
« Last Edit: November 17, 2018, 10:47:14 pm by Gyro »
Best Regards, Chris
 
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Offline LiteaceTopic starter

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #8 on: November 18, 2018, 12:18:10 pm »
I thought I'd disconnected the fan, I had but not properly, went done something else, when back fan was just about moving round, checked all cells very low voltage, put it in charger and bingo it charged and the battery % leds are again working.

With battery showing fully charged on charger, Ive checked the voltage of all the cells, the yesterdays 2 top 2.3v are now 3.50v, the rest, 3.9v are now  4.15v and Ive a battery voltage of 20.1v on B+ and B-

Is there a poss chance that as this is a 5 amp battery there is 4, 4 and 2

Like 2 packs of 4 x 4 = 16 then the 2 x 2 making it up to 20 volts ???

 

Offline coromonadalix

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #9 on: November 18, 2018, 05:09:45 pm »
Had problems with Dewalt 20v/60v Flex packs, they are made with 3 packs of 5 cells, they did output 20v or 60v, but the battery cells where not equal in voltage, they have a bms, but it doesnt work very well, had cells with 1v and other at almost 4 volts ???

The bms is not able to recover and equalize the cells ?
 
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Offline LiteaceTopic starter

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #10 on: November 18, 2018, 05:20:48 pm »
Sorry for being thick, what is a BMS ?
 

Offline Bratster

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #11 on: November 18, 2018, 06:57:49 pm »
Sorry for being thick, what is a BMS ?
Battery management system.

It's supposed to keep all the cells at the same voltage so none get too high or too low.

Sent from my Fi Moto x4 using Tapatalk

 
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Offline james_s

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #12 on: November 18, 2018, 08:10:03 pm »
Do you have a bench supply? You might try using that to carefully charge each cell to around 3V, that should be enough to satisfy the management circuitry. You have to be careful with Li-ion cells but the cylindrical metal type are much less prone to caching fire than the LiPo pouch type.
 
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Offline LiteaceTopic starter

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #13 on: November 18, 2018, 09:23:18 pm »
I can knock together a charger for charging individually, what voltage do I want to be pumping into them and for how long

What I cant understand it, if this is a 20v battery and it has 10 cells why are the cells not 2 volts each ?
 

Offline Bratster

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #14 on: November 18, 2018, 09:39:23 pm »
The cells are grouped with two in parallel so you have more current available,
and then those groups of two are run in series to get the voltage up high enough.

So it is basically only 5 cells in series.



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Offline james_s

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #15 on: November 18, 2018, 10:01:10 pm »
Charge each cell pair to about 3V, they'll be 3.7 or 4.2V fully charged depending on the chemistry they use but you don't need to fully charge them this way. I would suggest something in the area of 500-1000 mA charge current, it's not too critical though.
 
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Offline LiteaceTopic starter

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #16 on: November 18, 2018, 10:06:56 pm »
So is the problem here the cells are cheap rubbish or the BMS not managing its job properly

Are these just the 3.7 or 4.2 standard blue that most things are fitted with these days ?
 

Offline shakalnokturn

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #17 on: November 18, 2018, 10:25:18 pm »
Are these just the 3.7 or 4.2 standard blue that most things are fitted with these days ?

Not quite they are high discharge current models, a standard laptop or whatever model would be destroyed at the first screw driven.
 
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Offline LiteaceTopic starter

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #18 on: November 19, 2018, 12:38:05 am »

Not quite they are high discharge current models, a standard laptop or whatever model would be destroyed at the first screw driven.

Thanks for the info, what would I look for if I wanted to rebuild with new cells ?
 

Offline KL27x

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #19 on: November 19, 2018, 05:55:07 am »
In this case, it is possible that only 1 or 2 pairs of cells are really bad. The majority of the cells might be perfectly fine.

I would charge each pair of cells all the way to 4.2V, first. Then run the drill down. Then chuck which pairs of cells are abnormally low. It looks like your top pair is the most likely culprit, and some or even all of the others might be serviceable.

Also, during your individual charging of pairs, you might find some cells which will not reach 4.2V. And/or if they do, they immediately drop to say 4V or less after you disconnect them from the charger. I would replace these pairs, too.

If you want to replace cells, you would need to know the discharge and charge rates to make sure you match (or exceed) this rating. It will also be nice to  match or exceed the capacity in Amp Hours, so that the replacement pair doesn't end up being the weakest link and making the battery cut out when the other cells still have significant charge left in them.

If you have two pairs bad, you'd end up with 6 good cells. If you happened to find a bargain on cells that match or exceed the output capability (calculated by C rating times capacity) but are significantly different in capacity, you could break up the remaining good pairs and use 5 new cells in parallel with 5/6 of the remaining good pairs. This would maximize the capacity of the battery at the cost of discarding one of those cells. After someone complains that this is unsafe and stupid, I'll explain why they're wrong.   

It should go without saying, but your cells must have the same float voltage before you connect them in series. And all pairs should be holding a float voltage of 4.2V before you wire them into the battery.

*There are some slight differences in max voltage between different chemistries of li ion cells, but as far as I know most all hand tools are using essentially the same chemistry that is dominating the portable computing world and the electric car industry. I think it's the manganese variant. But anyone piping up about this... uh.. you should also mention that Beta Max is different than VHS.
« Last Edit: November 19, 2018, 06:14:06 am by KL27x »
 
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Offline shakalnokturn

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #20 on: November 19, 2018, 03:50:12 pm »

[/quote]

Thanks for the info, what would I look for if I wanted to rebuild with new cells ?
[/quote]

If you intend to replace the weak pair, better be looking for the same model. (They should have some marking on the side.)

Otherwise something along these lines:
https://www.powerstream.com/p/INR18650-25R-datasheet.pdf
 
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Offline LiteaceTopic starter

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #21 on: November 19, 2018, 10:32:48 pm »


If you intend to replace the weak pair, better be looking for the same model. (They should have some marking on the side.)

Otherwise something along these lines:
https://www.powerstream.com/p/INR18650-25R-datasheet.pdf

Sorry for all the questions, You guys are the experts, Im not, so need to ask.

I have also found this:

https://www.batteryspace.com/prod-specs/NCR18650B.pdf

I do have 2 x Panasonic toughbooks that Ive has for about 5 years, the batterys on those or sh1t hot and still holding out, in your option/s would the Panasonic cells be better than the Samsung cells ?
 

Offline KL27x

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #22 on: November 20, 2018, 02:05:57 am »
In the reality of things, the simplest and most effective way for your cordless tool to automatically cutout when the draw is too high is by measuring the voltage. So, the way your cordless tool decides what is "too much current" is really, in all likelihood, an indirect judgement based on the series voltage under load (or under stall, as the case may be).

So matching of the discharge and charge rates and capacity is important, but not that important. You might lose some torque if your replacement cells are weaker in C rating. OTOH, if you were to use cells with super high discharge capacility, you might end up with so much torque you could burn out a motor winding or other component by the time the cutout kicked in. But in reality, if you stall or grossly bog down the motor, you probably will let go of the trigger. (If not, you should).

The most important thing to do is to make sure your new cells are not being charged too fast by the charger. If you have one of those superfast chargers, this is a source of danger you have to pay attention to. The other important thing is to make sure each pair of cells drops in voltage at relatively the same rate. Similar to the way the tool decideds what is too much amps, the way it decides that the battery is dead is in all likelihood based on the cumulative series voltage of the cell. Yeah, it would be way way better for the tool to measure each pair of cells and cutout when the weakest one dropped to a certain limit. But most of these tools won't do that. So if the capacity of your replacement cells is way off from the rest, the worst cells will be repeatedly damaged by the time your drill decides to turn itself off. This is why in many cases there is just one really bad pair of cells in a battery, and the rest might be great. It's that one pair that is repeatedly abused.

That said, if your new cells are not greatly matched, you might just decide to stop using the drill when the battery indicator gets to 1 bar or something. Don't keep using it until it dies. Put the battery on the charger preemptively. As long as the charger is not crap, it is fine to charge a li ion battery frequently. You don't have to deep cycle it or other voodoo you might have learned with other battery types.

So if you are careful and you pay attention to what you're doing, and you observe the results and make sure the cells are staying within their limits when on the charger, you can probably get some useful life out of it. If it's not worth your time to take some voltage and temperature measurements/obserations for the first few cycles until you're sure everything is fine, then either don't do this yourself, or maybe put your charger in the middle of your yard when you want to use it. :) The charging is the most dangerous part, because no one has the patience to watch the water boil. OTOH, if the tool blows up and catches fire while you're using it, you might get a few scars, but you won't die. And if you are observant of the battery temp, even just touching the case the first few times you use it under heavy load, it is unlikely to ever get to that point.

But you do this yourself, you take your own chances. This applies whether or not some other "expert" endorses your battery choice with their stamp of approval. Better you use a completely inappropriate battery but do the proper experimentation and observation than to get the best cell and think you're fine.
« Last Edit: November 20, 2018, 02:32:10 am by KL27x »
 
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Offline LiteaceTopic starter

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #23 on: November 22, 2018, 08:32:15 pm »

The most important thing to do is to make sure your new cells are not being charged too fast by the charger. If you have one of those superfast chargers, this is a source of danger you have to pay attention to.



Yes it does have a very fast charger that I dont really need, I would, if it was poss to build or buy a very slow charger / conditioner as this gun now only gets used a few times per month, if anyone know of a good slow charger for these type of batteries I'd be interested

Thanks
« Last Edit: November 22, 2018, 08:58:34 pm by Liteace »
 

Offline LiteaceTopic starter

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Re: Cordless power-tool battery repair
« Reply #24 on: November 22, 2018, 09:04:16 pm »

The most important thing to do is to make sure your new cells are not being charged too fast by the charger. If you have one of those superfast chargers, this is a source of danger you have to pay attention to.



Yes it does have a very fast charger that I dont really need, I would, if it was poss to build or buy a very slow charger / conditioner as this gun now only gets used a few times per month, if anyone knows of a good way to slow charge for these type of batteries I'd be interested

Thanks
 


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