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There’s no universal cordless power tool battery – why?

toolguyd.com

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Re: There’s no universal cordless power tool battery – why?

#11

Post by version_five »

Vendor lock in is obviously a side effect, and there are consumer- hostile reasons why companies like proprietary batteries. But fundamentally the battery shape and power characteristics as well as the charging are still areas where companies can innovate and differentiate themselves. I'd rather have to choose a brand than get some out of date, un-ergonomic "approved" battery and connector that I have to use with my tools.

It's fundamentally different than phone cables, where the shape of the connector doesn't really matter and was / is purely a lock-in. There are big differences between the choices the cordless tool manufacturers have made re batteries. It's certainly not a place for government mandates.

Re: There’s no universal cordless power tool battery – why?

#12

Post by taeric »

h2odragon wrote: post #4

I want backpack battery packs for the bigger power users. Chainsaws and weed whackers and stuff in the gas engine range anyway. For smaller tools there could sensibly be a couple to 4? perhaps sizes of battery pack, "handheld" for screwdriver to toothbrush to "personal manipulation tools", a bit bigger for handheld drills; double that again for small saws and stuff... any bigger and it begins to become an an unwieldy…

The "egopower" vendor has some good products in this vein. I suspect others are catching up or passing them, but I've been very happy with the mower we have. The blower goes through the battery faster than anything else. But I'm very very grateful not to have gas in the garage for this. Even more grateful to no longer be mixing oil into gas to get these things to work.

Re: There’s no universal cordless power tool battery – why?

#13

Post by Rhapso »

If you have an angle grinder, quite a few premium/discount brand pairs become suddenly compatible with each other.

Same batteries with different plastic bits to keep them incompatible. Remove the plastic bits and suddenly your black and decker battery fits into the porter cable device no problems.

Re: There’s no universal cordless power tool battery – why?

#14

Post by throwawaaarrgh »

The tool costs $100. The battery costs $100. The tools only work with the one battery, the batteries need replacing, and you need more of them to use multiple tools at once.

It is about money. Money from batteries, money from vendor lock in. This isn't cynicism, it's economics. These companies would probably lose at least half of their profit, maybe much more, if they gave up the battery.

And there's more reasons. If you want people to buy more tools (of course you do) you want to be able to phase out the old tools, and the best way to do that is a new incompatible battery. Or if you want to use a different voltage. Or if you want to ensure the battery won't set the tool on fire and cause returns or lawsuits. Or if you want to change the balance, or form factor, or something else.

Re: There’s no universal cordless power tool battery – why?

#16

Post by Lio »

version_five wrote: post #11

Vendor lock in is obviously a side effect, and there are consumer- hostile reasons why companies like proprietary batteries. But fundamentally the battery shape and power characteristics as well as the charging are still areas where companies can innovate and differentiate themselves. I'd rather have to choose a brand than get some out of date, un-ergonomic "approved" battery and connector that I have to use with my…

What surprises me is that even within a single brand there are multiple standards.

Right now I mostly have Bosch Professional 18v kit. If I want a small edging router I have to biy a while new Bosch Professional 12v kit… unless I go with the Bosch “amateur” system which is different again.

I think there might also be another 10v Bosch Pro system as well. Why?

It’s like an xkcd.

Re: There’s no universal cordless power tool battery – why?

#17

Post by chungy »

h2odragon wrote: post #4

I want backpack battery packs for the bigger power users. Chainsaws and weed whackers and stuff in the gas engine range anyway. For smaller tools there could sensibly be a couple to 4? perhaps sizes of battery pack, "handheld" for screwdriver to toothbrush to "personal manipulation tools", a bit bigger for handheld drills; double that again for small saws and stuff... any bigger and it begins to become an an unwieldy…

> Look at the standard AA, C, D cell sizes and what they did for the electronics market.

On the flip side, look at how far we've strayed from that, with many devices only having their own proprietary battery.

Re: There’s no universal cordless power tool battery – why?

#18

Post by rgmerk »

h2odragon wrote: post #4

I want backpack battery packs for the bigger power users. Chainsaws and weed whackers and stuff in the gas engine range anyway. For smaller tools there could sensibly be a couple to 4? perhaps sizes of battery pack, "handheld" for screwdriver to toothbrush to "personal manipulation tools", a bit bigger for handheld drills; double that again for small saws and stuff... any bigger and it begins to become an an unwieldy…

Husqvarna makes a backpack battery. They charge about 1300 USD for it (or the equivalent thereof in my home country [1]). They don’t recommend it (and I’m not sure it’s compatible with) their electric chainsaws, only their brush cutters, leaf blowers etc. May be a safety thing, I’m not sure. The price, however, is pretty outrageous. Their smaller batteries are already a rip-off; the backpack battery is more expensive per watt-hour than the small ones.

In my view it’s time for regulators to step in and push the tool companies towards battery compatibility, as the technology is now mature enough for standards to be viable.

[1] https://www.husqvarna.com/au/battery-equipment/bli950x-backp...

Re: There’s no universal cordless power tool battery – why?

#19

Post by orthoxerox »

silisili wrote: post #3

Mentioned in the comments, I looked into CAS a couple years back. Sounds great in theory, but it seems the vast majority of partners using it are for one off, specialty tools... https://www.cordless-alliance-system.com/

Yes, it's basically Metabo plus lots of specialty tools companies that don't threaten but complement Metabo with their product ranges.
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