Pretty weasel-worded warranty anyhow: Full Lifetime Warranty | RIDGID Tools
but you might check — could be you’re in one of the unnamed provinces or countries that doesn’t allow them such restrictive terms, as the page hints about.
Well, don’t think of the upgrade to NiMH in terms of cost versus buying a new pack. The capacity difference from 1300mAH to 2000mAH is fairly significant. And, it doesn’t say so at the link I posted, but I think those Tenergy cells are low self discharge. NiCad are not, so a new pack would not help you at all in that regard. I don’t know what the shipping would be to Canada, but with the strong difference in capacity, and the LSD property of the cell, I think you’d be getting the better value with the re-build. But, if you can fit those AA Eneloops in there, you’d be getting the same deal. So if you can get those cheaper than the 4/5 Sub-C cells, then that works too!
What’s the point in replacing Ni-Cd batteries with NiMH? It looks like pointless makework (and spending more money for no good reason) when Li-ion (or even LiFePO4 if you are feeling picky, want very high current or match the previous voltage closer) has been available for ages?
It is a budget thing.
Lithium battery rechargeable tools are awesome and they have very low self discharge.
This discussion is about the most economical way to continue using existing tools
when the original battery pack stops working. Some people just want to keep things
out of the landfill, but want to do it at a reasonable cost.
The NiMH vs NiCd discussion is because “most” recent NiCd chargers can handle NiMH.
It becomes more hacky if one cannot use the original charger after retrofit.
LiFePo batteries are awesome, but retrofitting them into an old rechargeable drill battery pack
is not economical even compared to buying a brand new lithium-battery tool set.
How this budget thing prevents you from installing fresh Li-ion in your old battery? They both have indisputably better performance than Ni-Cd or Ni-MH and lower price per power pack.
I am not expecting the existing Ridgid battery charger (for the existing NiCd battery) to be able to handle Li-ion charging.
It will rapidly get expensive (and increase implementation difficulty) if I have to rig a different charging setup and buy a
hobby charger that can handle Li-ion.
NiMH cells fit the battery case; they charge OK with the charger circuit built into the ham radio and with the desktop charger for the radio.
All the currently available battery packs for this same model radio are now using NiMH cells.
The NiCd cells were quite old and not holding charge well.
Decent hobby balance charger costs less than $10. And Li-ion cells are both cheaper and more powerful than Ni-MH for a powerpack. They also don’t have any problems with self-discharge. So you’ll end up paying less for better result.
And if you are really tight on money, you can skip balance charger and just mod your original charger with a DC-DC converter to charge the pack without balancing, since 3S to 5S battery made with good cells should have a pretty long life even without balancing.
I know that Ni-Cd cells die on whim. I just say that there is not much point in using Ni-MH for rebuild when you can do it with Li-ion. It’s like using 3xAAA adapter with Ni-MH cells in a flashlight instead of one 18650.
Well, we know what the point of it is. But, yeah, it’s obvious that you’re missing the point. A NiMH cell has a lot of properties which are similar to NiCad. So, a NiMH can pretty much just Drop In where a NiCad has been used before, as long as the tool-pack charger supports it. You’re right in saying that Li-Ions are definitely more bang for the buck in lots of ways. But they are so different from both NiCad and NiMH, that extra considerations need to be taken. Safety can’t be so easily dismissed for one thing. You really need a BMS for Li-Ion cells to charge them in series. You might be able to get by without BMS for LiFePO4 cells. Lots of people have done so. But not everybody is comfortable with that. Re-using the old charger without needing to modify it is also a consideration.
You used an analogy of putting a 3xAAA in a flashlight instead of using Li-Ion to illustrate that it doesn’t make sense to you. But, do you realize that some of those lights are made for the 3xAAA carrier? A lot of them are made in a way that Li-Ion doesn’t easily fit, and modifications need to be made, or at least a spacer, to be able to use a Li-Ion cell. But, even ignoring all that, the analogy doesn’t exactly fit. The difference here is that the tool-pack is made as an integral unit. The cells are not removed and charged separately. They are charged together inside the tool-pack, using the charger which is made for the purpose. It’s a system. A better analogy is a car battery. The built-in charging system in a car is made to work with the properties of a lead-acid battery. Changing to Li-Ion can be done, but it takes a lot of consideration. And the system has to be re-built around the different chemistry and its properties, or you risk damage. With Lithium cells of all types, “damage” can mean even a loss of life. It’s not as simple as you try to make it out to be.
I have a tool-pack that I’m hoping to convert to Li-Ion. I’ve bought the cells, the BMS, and a CC/CV charger module to upgrade the old tool-pack charger with. IMHO, that’s the right way to do it. Not everyone wants to go that far. NiMH is a significant upgrade from Ni-Cad in lots of ways, so it makes sense for those people who don’t want to bother with Li-Ion.
Another fact that you fail to recognize is that some people simply don’t like Li-Ion and just don’t want to use it. Even the famous Old-Lumens said before that even though he has made so many awesome flashlight mods and scratch-built lights that all run on Li-Ion, that he really prefers not to use Li-Ion. Whether you agree with that sentiment or not, it is a choice that people have a right to make.
Take pictures and show us the charger you bought, the wiring harness you bought, and how you’re wiring all this stuff together in the battery pack container.
It will be fun to watch.
eneloops may or may not have low enough ir to work well.
i would look at the specs for the originals and compare.lower ir(internal resistance/esr) is better.
not as big a deal with say an 18vtool vs my versapak wizard.lower voltage(3.6v) and very high current.a 25r gets warm if i use it hard.
For most power tool packs you want to use power tool grade cells with higher discharge rates. Eneloops can handle a few cycles at 10A, but are ideal at <5A discharge for regular use. The only packs I’ve rebuilt with eneloops have been lower discharge packs for like radio’s and other lower power electronics.
Yea I still am. However, I am not doing any Ni-Cd packs, unless its Ni-Cd AA sized cells which in many cases can be replaced with Eneloops. I’ve been doing a lot of porter cable 18v Li-ion packs lately and some Black and Decker and Ryobi as well. These Porter Cable 18v Li-ion packs are not being made anymore, and when you can find them on ebay new they go for like $70-120 usually for a 1.3Ah pack. I’ve been rebuilding them to 2.5Ah for much much less money for almost double the capacity. I’ve also done quite a number of HID flashlight packs. The 3x18650 and the 6x18650 packs, and even some Olight SR90 style packs.
It’s really awesome when I can increase a packs capacity without increasing the size a of a pack. I picked up one of those costco CAT LED worklights. Wasn’t impressed by the 4400mAh capacity (2x18650’s). I opened it up, and with a slight mod to the internals was able to fit in 3x 18650’s. I went with Sanyo GA 3500mAh cells. So I went from 4400mAh to 10,500mAh in the same worklight. Battery life should be around 5 hours compared to 2 hours.
Wow! Nice!
You said you’re not doing Ni-Cd, but you’ve been doing a lot of Li-Ion packs lately. I wonder if you’d be willing to do an upgrade from Ni-Cd to Li-ion. I have some DeWalt 18V Ni-Cd packs that I’m wanting to convert. These use the Sub-C Ni-Cd cells currently. I would also convert the charger base by installing a CC/CV Li-Ion charger board in it. But, if you’d be willing to do the pack conversion, I’ve got several packs I could send to you. The hard part is figuring out which cells to use to get the most capacity in the space. I was going to use 18500 cells, in which case I’d have to lengthen the pack a bit for them to fit. Maybe you can come up with something better. Anyway, let me know if you’d be willing to give it a go.
Once you put NiCad’s into your past, they will stay there. In their time they were great but NiMh is cheap today and not needing anything else, they make for a great way to extend the usefulness of cordless tools. And for most folks NuMh is good enough- I still haven’t switched to LiIon in my cordless tools yet and I both work my tools hard and all day long sometimes. I’ll be making the switch soon though.
I have an extensive collection of DeWalt 18V tools; luckily they sell a LiIon conversion pack and charger. It will cost me well into 4 figures to replace them all with the new 20V LiIon line of tools so for now I’ll just keep these going as I’m not rich 
So yeah, sometimes it just doesn’t make sense to do things when that seems an obvious “best choice”. Just because something can be done isn’t always a good reason to do it!
Phil
I just looked up the Li-Ion packs they have for sale. Those are less capacity (yet higher price) than the Ni-Cad packs they would be replacing, so not really an upgrade. :rage:
You’re almost right David. the direct replacement LiIon is only 2A vs the NiMh 2.4A. But there’s an adapter available which lets you use their 20V LiIon batteries (which DeWalt says are actually 18 v 
) and then you can get sizes up to 5.0A batteries- woohoo!
They’ve finally released a 20V 16ga finish nailer but it doesn’t take the nails I like so I’m still waiting to begin doing my tool upgrade. And when I do that upgrade I’ll already have the batteries, allowing me to save $$$ by buying bare tools instead of kits 
As poor as I am, those smaller ‘bites’ are the only way I can manage things.
Phil
Oh, I didn’t know they had adapters to fit the 20V batteries to the 18V drills! And technically, if your cells are 3.6V Nominal, then 5x would be 18V! They probably named them 20V just as a differentiator. Unknowing customers just think bigger numbers mean more power. So, more power should also need a bigger number just to NOT confuse those people! :laughing:
Yeah, there was a huge “more voltage is better” race before LiIon’s came to market. It wound up with tools too heavy to use and tool lines with just a few tools in them before development stopped. There are still some huge cordless numbers for super-heavy-duty tools,but most companies have settled around the 20V mark as the best balance between power and practicality with most tools.
After getting started in cordless and finding the tool I needed had dead batteries while other tools with different batteries were charged, I decided that the most practical approach was to have one system for all my cordless tools; that almost guarantees you’ll have a charged battery on hand. In business time is money and whereas the “average Joe” might be able to wait to charge up, I don’t. The downside is that when your system becomes obsolete you’re looking at replacing everything all at once. DeWalt has ended development of it’s 18V tool line and ceased manufacture of almost all of the lesser-sold tools. How long they will support the system with new batteries and chargers is anybody’s guess, but I see the writing on the wall so I want to upgrade while my old tools can still be sold at a decent price.
Especially with cordless tools if you plan much use, high quality is going to make a far better investment than the cheap ones. You don’t get what you don’t pay for!
Phil
It’s not as simple as just throwing some new Li-ions inside of a dewalt 18v Ni-Cd shell. They use Sub-C sized batteries (totally different from 18650). And most power tool packs use a protection circuit with BMS. And then your charger would no longer work. It’s possible to do a bodge job and use a balancing connector and an RC charger, but thats a bit sketchy for my taste.
Yea its funny 20v = 18v. It’s just all marketing fluff where they are rating the pack by its max charge voltage instead of its nominal voltage. Bigger numbers = bigger sales (or so the marketing people think). The funny thing is in the EU (due to consumer protection laws) these companies can’t use their 20v marketing bs, and have to slap 18v on them instead. 40v = 36v also, just marketing bs. And 12v = 10.8v.
I know the pack would need a BMS. And I’m certain you won’t easily fit 5x 18650 in there, even though the pack was made with 15x Sub-C cells. There isn’t enough length inside the pack’s shell. What I thought to do was use 15x Panasonic 18500 cells (wired 5S3P), along with a BMS made for at least 5S Li-Ion voltage. This would require some modification of the pack shell to get everything to fit. Then, in the charger base, install a 5S Li-Ion compatible CC/CV charger circuit. I actually have already bought most of the parts to do one pack and charger myself, but I don’t have the right equipment really to do it well. These tools take a lot of abuse at times. The pack has to be able to withstand some hard bumps.