You're buying into a battery platform, not the tools.

narfcake thought this was worth mentioning said 2 hours ago

Forgot where I read it, but in talking about cordless power tools, it’s not so much about buying the tools themselves but buying into their battery platform, which is only good as long as there’s continued support. Anyway this is for random discussions of cordless power tools and their batteries.

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narfcake said 2 hours ago:
Branching off the discussion with @aetris from here about these tools, in which I tasked myself with trying to see if there are any alternatives to the Neo and Tacklife batteries.
- The terminals are NOT male/female blades, which eliminates Milwaukee M12, Bosch/Dremel 10.8V/12V, and Makita 10.8V.
- It’s not Hyper Tough, in which the both sides of the retainer prongs dip down.
- The cat-sat-on-a-keyboard brands seem to have a thicker base, which may rule them out.
… so, anyone else have a take on this?
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heartny said 2 hours ago:

Many years ago I bought a bunch of Black and Decker power tools that had nifty removable rechargeable batteries. There was an outlet store near me so I was able to get a good deal. However, the batteries sucked and wouldn’t hold a charge, so I think the technology was abandoned. I don’t seem to have the power tools any longer and I don’t remember if I tossed or returned them.

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- @heartny If do run across them and they’re the 18V, then considering an adapter may be worthwhile ONLY IF you already have some B&D or P-C 20V batteries. If you don’t, then it’s not worth it IMHO. You’d be spending more than the tool’s value.
  
  narfcake said an hour ago
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narfcake said 2 hours ago:
Adapters for older battery platforms to newer ones:
- Black & Decker 18V: If you still have tools with the slide-on 18V Ni-Cad batteries, a HPA1820 adapters lets one use more modern Black & Decker or Porter Cable 20V batteries.
  /image HPA1820
- Porter Cable 18V: This was their platform before the current “20V Max”. Look for a BSP20PO adapter.
  /image BSP20PO
- DeWalt 18V “pod” style: DCA1820; the official one has a voltage protection circuit, the generics may not. That is because on the newer 20V DeWalt, the low voltage protection on the tools themselves. Without such, it’s very well possible to run down the battery to below 0%, potentially damaging them to the point of no return.
  /image DCA1820
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