Archived from the Tools In Action forum (Power Tools). This thread is read-only.
Does anyone have an idea at what Voltage one should recharge a 14.4V NiCd drill battery at, as oposed to just letting the battery run down by means of drill slowying.
I only ask as I often take my drills battery down too far, as I mistake its low drainage for drilling into somthing hard or go until it completly stops and never charges again.
I have a multimeter and thought it would be just as easy to check the voltage as I do with my 12v Solar ones. I ussually never let those drop below 11.6 Volts which has worked well for me over the years.
What Voltage is getting low for a NiCd, or is this method of using a multimeter not aplicble to nicds?
Davekyn,
From my understanding, NiCd batteries have a pretty reliable chemistry, so running down to low voltage doesn’t damage the cells like it does in, say, Lithium Ion. I think you should be fine if you charge them once they show a noticeable power fade, but since they’re prone to developing memories you don’t really want to charge them half-way down, nor do you want to charge it only half-way back up before using it again.
David is right, You just have to watch out with Lithiums. Although don’t keep nicads stored empty for extended periods