Milwaukee M18 Battery replaced after 4 years

I have been using Milwaukee corded and cordless hand tools for years.

4 years ago I upgraded to the M18 Li-Ion circular saw, 1/2" drill, LED flash light, and 1/2" & 3/8" impacts.

Batteries have held power and taken charges well, but I noticed one of the pack's power gauge stopped working. Upon close look, there was a crack below the top cover that kept the gauge from working, but when squeezed together it worked.

My first reaction was to try and fix it, then I remembered it was covered by a 5-year warranty. I looked over the other 2 batteries and found another 1 with a similar crack.

I called Milwaukee and the customer rep. said based on the sn's they would pro-rate the coverage, since full coverage is for the first 2 years.

OK, I boxed them up and sent them off with a pre-paid Fed-Ex shipping label on a Wed. Tracked the package to TX, and it arrived on that Fri. The next I knew I had a box on the porch the next Tuesday.

WTW? Did they send me 1 or 2 replacements and bill me?

I opened up the box and found 2 replacement M18 batteries with an invoice.

Free!

good deal, I wish I could get a free battery out of them, all mine are ****.

I wasn't expecting 2 new - FREE - batteries. I thought a 'store' credit.

The batteries are the weak points of the cordless crowd.

Milwaukee has stepped up.

I am more convinced than ever, switching from fire prone Dewalts was the right thing to do, when they had a recall on their chargers and never notified me a registered owner.

I love Milwaukee Tools, hell, I'm wearing their t-shirt right now.

As a relatively new user of cordless power tools, I have a question...
what IS the life expectancy of a battery pack?? say lithium-ion pack?


Sorry... I don't mean to hi-jack, I was just curious after reading this thread.

That entirely depends on how much you use them. I think typically Li-Ion batteries have a rating for how many times you can charge them. 2000 times comes to mind when reading the specs on one of the batteries... correct me if I'm wrong.