I can buy an after market grill for my 99 Suburban for $80.00. I am afraid to know what a factory grill would cost.
How come no one out there is selling off brand rechargable NiCad batteries for my dewalt tools?
Maybe there is no answer.
What I am hoping... is that one of you bright, well informed guys is going to shoot me an e-mail with a web address that will link me to a page where $50.00 batteries are falling off trees just waiting to be harvested.
A number of companies exist that rebuild batteries to various qualities. If you can get Panasonic cells you are doing well, they generally perform best.
I could tell you of at least two battery rebuild companies but something tells me you don't want to send them to Australia. Where are you? Assuming you're an American and not from one of the other 100 or so countries on the internet, try:
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of these are under $50, I can't promise they fell off a tree though:
$80???? Hell, I'm looking at $90 for a LF turn signal assembly for my 1990 Trooper. Some enterprising bastich swiped mine . . .
Because B&D, the parent company of Dewalt, patented the battery pack connect design and won't license it.
Was a rumor back in '99 or so that the B&D batteries packs would fit the dewally line if you filed off a tab. B&D batteries packs were about $10-20 cheaper than the Dewalt but packed a lower a/h rating. I never investigated the rumor so I don't know if it's true.
B&D (or any of the other manufacturers, for that matter) won't license the design to third parties because it's a major cash cow for them just like any consumable is for any manufacturer. Think cheap razors and how much replacement blades cost.
There's an interesting sub-culture on ebay that specialized in power tools and their battery packs. Take a look at all the cordless tools sold w/o packs. Some folks figure at $80 a pop for 18V dewalt it's cheaper to buy a drill kit w/2 packs for $200 and sell the tool for $50/60 bucks.
There's also a fair number of pack-only auctions but most of those which are NIB go for maybe $10 less than store prices and the seller makes it up in handling charges. I suspect a number of the NIB batteries either "fell off a truck" or were liberated from the waste stream.
Like t'other respondent I'd check out the rebuild services. Two that come to mind are Primecell, which appears to be N.A. only, and Batteries Plus which seems to be a franchise - a quick google turned up the fact that they've expanded to at least the UK and Oz.
I've got a buddy who works at the Borg, which has a drop off box for defunct cordless tool batteries. I've been considering offering him $10 for a couple of liberated battery packs and dorking around with cell replacement, see how that works. I'll let the group know if anything comes of it.
Well, a 90 Trooper was decidedly downmarket as SUVs go. Also, that $90 is a quote from a junkyard, not an Isuzu dealer. Damn I wish the manufacturers would just sell parts direct to the consumer.
ROFL. Nice understatement.
BTW, I see you in ahr and rfc a lot. Wonder how many more overlaps we've got. The Porch?
I realize I may be a simple backwoods fella but have you guys tried the JunkYard, and I dont mean these new "salvage yards" I mean a good ol junk yard where there is a mean ass dog out front and you go find the part yourself. You pay minimal cost, you get fresh air (albeit filled with old car parts/dogpoop/leakyfluids) and a good walk
If I could find a real junkyard around here (Northern VA) that wasn't five hours out in BFE I'd be there in a NY minute. Unfortunately between the high land values and the excess of a-holes (read: shysters) it's prohibitive for anyone to own a pick-your-own junkyard.
Was a place about 2/3rd of the way down to Charlottesville when I was going to school there called Leon's. Acres 'n acres of "well . . . the Fords on on that hill yonder, behind that's the commercial trucks, Dodge (this was before Dodge-Chrsyler) over to the right about 400 yards . . ."
Not in this case. The guy that broke it paid for it. The high tech salvage yard found one a thousand miles away and wanted $125 + shipping for it.
Couple of the junk yards around here have "all you can carry" days. For a fixed $$$, if one man can carry it from the yard across the white line, it is yours for $25 or so. Ed
You can cut it apart and replace the internal batteries,, but then you will need to epoxy it back together,, batteries are batteries.
I know with handheld radio equipment after about five years they "sold off" proprietary stuff to other companies,, where you could make the replacement affordably.
Obviously, I'm late into this thread, but did you try to find a "Batteries Plus" store? I'll place my disclaimer here right now - my son is a manager of one of these franchises. I have no personal financial interest in it, other than I've purchased some good stuff from there.
Batteries Plus specializes in rebuilding battery packs for all battery powered devices and tools. The can also make battery packs for cordless tools and devices, including medical devices. They also sell batteries of all kinds, from car and motor home batteries to batteries for computer UPS's and motorized wheel chairs. Usually they can rebuild a battery pack for a cordless tool for about half the price of replacing it.
Some tools may not be able to have their battery packs rebuilt - not sure specifically about DeWalt. It might be worth to find the nearest Batteries Plus location and take it in to be looked at. I have one of their after market rechargeable for my 12 volt Makita drill, and it works great. He also built me a pack for the same drill, which also works great.
Here's a link to their website which contains a store locator -
There are those too, just not in tool batteries too much yet (though I do remember seeing a Lion battery drill somewhere which was in the $500 price range too). I've found that most tool packs are in series (divide the total voltage by
1.2 and you should end with the number of batteries in the pack) therefore the A/H or mA/H rating of the pack will equal the rating of the individual cells. Another small hint, _IF_ your charger is fairly low tech (doesn't time the charge, doesn't have a chip to keep track of charge times, etc) you can replace the cells with a bit higher A/H rating. This works on the simple chargers NiCAD that just put a charging current and turn off when the voltage hits a certain threshold since a NiCad charge rate is basically a percent of the total rating of the cell. Say for example a 1000mAH cell would charge at 100mA (I can't remember the percent so I'm use 10% for my example here) until it hits 1.2000 volts. A 1200mAH cell would then need a
120mA charge current however 100mA is close enough to work fine and the charger will just hold 100mA until the 1.200v mark is met the shut off so it will just take a bit longer.
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