Poor Man's Battery Powered Tools

[Brazen Bull]

The desire to add a cord to things that don’t have a cord is weird.

Weird huh? would you like to send me a new fresh Milwalki M18 Fuel saw for free? No??? Than shut your pie hole.
Without a cord and without spending money on scrap battery tools that are probably on their last legs anyways, they are just going to sit there DEAD.
I have no big "desire" to add a cord to healthy fresh out of the box cordless tools, perhaps experimentally.
I'm adding a cord and a boat anchor 12v battery to make this useless scrap useful again in a semi-stationary backyard situation.
I live in a **** hole apartment that used to be a KFC in the 50's. So no gardon hose, and no outside outlets of any kind.

 

[neophyte]

The desire to add a cord to things that don’t have a cord is weird.

The reason the Hilti product exists, is because batteries used be fairly heavy, and large, especially if you needed decent capacity, and hanging the battery from a belt was less tiring than having the battery attached to the tool.
The belt system could probably cut a pound or more off the tool weight, and someone used to wearing a heavy tool belt would hardly notice the weight of the battery attached to a decent tool belt.
In the “original” “cordless” tools, from 50 years ago or so, the batteries were probably lead acid batteries, possibly from a car or motorcycle, or adapted from that type of battery, and having the battery attached to the tool was just not reasonable.

 

[PugetDude]

The desire to add a cord to things that don’t have a cord is weird.

In all fairness, it does work better than cutting the cords of of tools that were designed to have them.

 

[Brazen Bull]

Check this out gents. Aparently the first cordless drill was made by B&D in 1961.
It has a self contained battery and it is very much like a modern cordless drill
without any BS like the handle being a foot long to accommodate lots of batteries (im looking at you 1980's Makita).
I'd love to know what 50's battery cell technology they put in that drill.
I'd love to see a picture of the inside of that thing.

 

[Brazen Bull]

$59.90 in 1961 money equals about $649.04 in 2025 money for a cordless drill and charger.
It looks from the outside like just a heavily modified corded drill from their own lineup.

So would it be too much of a stretch to think some guy already owning a corded one (like the one attached below), and making a plywood box with a carry handle with batteries in it, to plug his 110v drill into. I'd see him up on a ladder with the little boxy thing sitting on the paint can shelf with his metal 1958 drill wired into it. Than carrying it and the drill down one handed.

Maybe using one of those ubiquitous aluminum lunch boxes with an outlet mounted in the side.

A bunch of Ni-Cads in series running the drill intermittently should still be pretty small, lunch box sized small would fit the task.
Gimmicky? Hell YES. And impractical and short lived between charges, but i've seen flakier DIY projects in Pop Mechanics from that time.

 

[dscheidt]

Check this out gents. Aparently the first cordless drill was made by B&D in 1961.
It has a self contained battery and it is very much like a modern cordless drill
without any BS like the handle being a foot long to accommodate lots of batteries (im looking at you 1980's Makita).
I'd love to know what 50's battery cell technology they put in that drill.
I'd love to see a picture of the inside of that thing.

It's got a 1/4" chuck, which tells you how much power it has (or doesn't have...). And the claimed run times are pretty pathetic (200 1/4" holes in 3/4" fir). It used NiCd batteries, which is what the first successful cordless tools used, too, but there's not enough volume in the handle to have a battery with reasonable energy storage (which is why those Makita handles were so big). You can see why it wasn't a smashing success.

 

[IndyGarage]

If you need cheap cordless tools, just go to the pawn shop, pick up a few used cordless tools in the inexpensive brand of your choice - my pawn shop always has 100 or so Ryobi cordless tools on hand - and buy a couple of new batteries and charger to go along with them.

 

[ChevyEFI]

The desire to add a cord to things that don’t have a cord is weird.

When I read the bit about corded Lydia, and referring to pie holes,I figured no kink shaming applied to this thread.

 

[Brazen Bull]

It's got a 1/4" chuck, which tells you how much power it has (or doesn't have...). And the claimed run times are pretty pathetic (200 1/4" holes in 3/4" fir). It used NiCd batteries, which is what the first successful cordless tools used, too, but there's not enough volume in the handle to have a battery with reasonable energy storage (which is why those Makita handles were so big). You can see why it wasn't a smashing success.

Apparently after battery technology and such caught up,atleast the technology turned out to be a smashing success.
And even that first model with specs we would laugh at today, well guys still forked out the 60's cash
to buy it.
I think its damn impressive because your looking at it wrong, people hadn't seen anything like this yet. It was only a few years ahead of the effing 1950's!
And to have a drill you could carry up a ladder or walk around with freely, this was the cats ***!

All well some people are "glass is half empty folks".

Its like in 1998 comparing the early batch of LCD screens that probably did only 1024x768 at best, vs a $2,000+ CRT monitor that could do 1920x1080p HD.

 

[dnschmidt]

Eff this! Every time I come out of my shell and try to talk about my meager hobbies, scumbags have to piss all over it.
Get bent.

Please promise to never come back. Everybody wins, you feel better and all of us feel better too. A classic example of a Win-Win situation.

 

[IndyGarage]

Please promise to never come back. Everybody wins, you feel better and all of us feel better too. A classic example of a Win-Win situation.

Listen, that is not fair. The guy has a right to present his ideas and not be chastised for them.

 

[Oregon Dave]

Listen, that is not fair. The guy has a right to present his ideas and not be chastised for them.

I happen to agree with IndyGarage; information is just information, not good, not bad; just information.

On that basis new information shared here on GJ has a value and should be welcomed in the GJ manor; it can be obvious, immediately helpful, or useful in the future. Goes in the wet drive; fodder, may germinate something later.

Brazen Bull hopefully you will to contribute to the community.

 

[Oregon Dave]

Eff this! Every time I come out of my shell and try to talk about my meager hobbies, scumbags have to piss all over it.
Get bent.

I appreciate your thought process & effort; would also appreciate it if you continue to share your information & experience with the GJ community.

 

[Brazen Bull]

Oregon Dave, IndyGarage, jayemm, jendriver, bonneyman; and any of the other kind folk I missed.​

I took a good deep breath and reminded myself that meanhearted, preditory, toxic folks like dnschmidt, are to be expected to pop up in the game of life. Most people are not like that, and on a day like yesterday when everything seemed to go wrong, he pressed on a sore spot and I melted down. I am sorry for that.
To the kind folks here, no I'm not going to run away and abandon this place like this this gutless bully craves.
Going to keep tinkering and thinking and being positive; and I hope I CAN contribute to this interesting and thought provoking forum, if I get more practice and experience under my belt.

 

[Twisted Sid]

I remember watching cartoon Beetlejuice in the 90's as a kid, there was one episode where I kinda remember Lydia being somewhere with a laser pistol and it was connected to a power box on her belt by an umbilical cable; I liked that idea.
I like the idea of 3D printing a box that can clip to my belt like a tape measure with the 18650s in it and having a cable going to my Milwaukee Fuel M18 drill with a blank piece also 3D printed for the **** of the drill.
It would take some weight out of the drill for my scrawny arm. And potentially I could make use of any 18v power pack
and not Milwaukee's proprietary over priced lithium battery packs that DON'T do cell charge balancing.

 

[NUTTSGT]

Please promise to never come back. Everybody wins, you feel better and all of us feel better too. A classic example of a Win-Win situation.

We can agree to disagree but acting ****** towards your fellow member will get you some vacation time. No reason to act like this towards others. If you can't refrain from comments like this, maybe you should find another forum.

Listen, that is not fair. The guy has a right to present his ideas and not be chastised for them.

I don't always agree with Indy, probably more to disagree but with this post, he's spot on.


Did the OP get a little pissy, yes, but only after he was attacked and belittled. He also came back to apologize.

Thread closed.