Paper Trail

Old cordless drill turned into a new 12-volt drill.

Cheap cordless drills seem to last longer than the batteries that come with them. The problem is, a replacement battery is usually more than half the price of a new (cheap) drill. As far as I’m concerned, I might as well buy a new drill, which usually comes with two new batteries. The batteries usually last for 12 to 18 months. This presents a problem, though. I now have a small collection of cordless drills and no way to power and use them.

One solution is to find an alternate power supply, like I’ve shown in the picture. Shown is an old 12-volt Sears drill, perfect for running from a 12-volt autotive battery. I gutted the old battery and soldered a two-conductor cable to the battery shell’s connectors. On the other end of the cable, I attached battery clips. I now have a drill I can carry in my vehicle and power directly from the vehicle battery.

My next challenge is to figure out how to re-power my 18-volt drill.

Maybe it’s time to quit buying the cheapies and invest in a professional-grade tool.

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 7th, 2008 at 10:01 pm and is filed under Workshop. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.