This video shows you how to replace the batteries inside you old Black and Decker HPB18 Power Pack battery with parts from a Harbor Freight Tools battery.
The tip about the screws into the plastic case was worth the entire video. It deserves a video all its own. Please, Richard, do some more videos, you rock!
this saved me about $85 3 b&d batteries new are 3@$40=$129 with tax 3 harbor freight batteries was $44 with tax with -20% coupons took me like 15 minutes each thanks for the video Bob
Thank you so much for this very helpful video. I would never have felt comfortable trying this on my own. I followed your instructions explicitly and it works perfectly. I bought the more expensive battery for $16.99 at Harbor Freight and used their 20% discount coupon, so compared to the OEM battery at $39.97 I made out great. As a bonus, I learned some soldering tricks that I previously did not know, and as a consequence I'm much better at soldering. Sooooo again, THANK YOU so much!!!
Hello there mr. Inquisitive. Your instructional video on replacing Black & Decker batteries with the Harbor Freight batteries was a godsend. For over 10 years or more I have struggled to charge these Black & Decker batteries. I bought several tools that worked with them and never was able to use them for the very reasons you described in your video. I intended to throw all the tools away and the batteries and that's when I saw your video. Just two days ago I bought three Harbor Freight batteries and was able to successfully install and solder them. They work! For $45 I am now ready to reuse all these helpful tools thanks to you. Lee
This video was perfect for me because other than color, (the case of some Black and Decker (B & D) batteries are red and black and some are all black) my batteries looked exactly like his. Richard is thorough and does not waste time in the presentation. He cautions us to be careful. He's right. After I removed the wire connectors from the terminals on the Harbor Freight (H F) pack and they were each still attached to the battery pack on one end but the other ends were flying free, my red and black wires flicked together at one point and the sparks and smoke were kind of exciting. I immediately wrapped in tape both connections (separately--not wrapped together) and also taped the one on the little wire to the heat sensor until I could later get it cut off. My B & D batteries were of the shorter variety and the new Harbor Freight ones were of the taller variety, so I removed the plastic insert, as Richard does, from the bottom of the B & D case before I put in the new H F battery pack. My new Harbor Freight battery pack still would not allow the case to close on the lock release end of the case. I removed the battery pack, used a chisel and cut off the tiny posts in the bottom of the case, except for a couple on the non-lock release end, which I could have been cut off too. That was enough and the H F pack fit beautifully. I may have created the problem of fit because I did not remove the paper from the bottom of the H F battery pack as Richard did (he moved it to the top). But I added an additional one to the top which came from my original B & D battery pack. So in other words it slightly increased the overall thickness by about 1/32" to maybe 3/64". My new battery tested 18.+ volts. It runs my drill fine without charging it first. Maybe I should still put it on the charger. I used a white out pen and wrote on my "new" B & D battery case the date, Harbor Freight, and the item #.
Worked great! In Aug 2013 I used this video Black & Decker Battery to replace batteries in one battery pack. My harbor freight no longer carries that model battery. Lucky that the one featured here works. Really appreciate the video.
Have a B&D 18v pole saw. Has same batt which is goin south. It's the 1500mh pak. Bought one of the drill & 2 batt pk today at Wallymart for $50. Since I have an older Firestorm 12v drill & the batt is 8yrs old. New batt for it is $45. So it is basically obsolete in my book when the batt finally dies. So it made since to get the twin batt & new drill. Found that the new batts with the drill are 4oz lighter. Took one apart & found that they are the 1300mh batts with the spacer. Both dated 2014. Oh well, still ahead of the game! Can use for both tools! Thanx Richard
this process works VERY well. The price has gone up a bit to $16.99 at Harbor Freight. All I had to do was what you said, change the charging connection. Piece of cake!
I just rebuilt one of these using the exact same battery at Harbor Freight. It works great. I paid $15.99 but I had a 20% off coupon. (about $12.50 or so plus tax) I put electrical tape over all the contacts so I didn't accidentally touch the wire to them. Thanks man.
Just tried this on 2 packs. Excellent video with detailed instructions. Only thing I would add is using liquid electrical tape on the positive lead and reusing the insulated cardboard from bottom of old battery pack.
Thanks for posting this. It saves money and if you are an experienced tech like I am. It is awesome to save the money and make it work. Thanks. Also, my batteries had over a 19v charge. I was very careful not to make anything touch. I used a non-conductive surface to work with.
Just rebuilt 2 B &D 18 volt batteries with HF batteries which cost about $13.59 ea. with 20% off. Also did a Ryobi battery but had to completely disassemble battery pack. So far they seem to work better than originals.
August 7, 2017: Hi Richard. Thanks for making this video. It's excellent. Some viewers complained that it's too long, but I needed all the details you provided. Using your step-by-step instructions, I rebuilt four B&D batteries using HF 68860 cells. Separately, one B&D batteries I rebuilt using HF 68860 cells in July 2015 failed in July 2017. (I think the original B&D battery lasted about four years.) Makes me wonder if HF 68860 cells are cheaper (i paid $16.99 + tax) because they're lower quality. I rebuilt my other B&D batteries in 2016, so we'll see if they last longer than 2018. Thanks again and well done.
Good job with your video and explanation of how to rebuild a nicad battery pack. I believe you said this was your first attempt at making a "How-to" RU-vid video. You'll get a few more years of use from your drills at a greatly reduced cost by using the Harbor Freight battery packs. Next time the nicad batteries fail, consider switching to Lithium Ion cells for your rebuild. Watch for a good deal on Lithium Ion cells and buy them while you are enjoying your nicad battery packs. Thanks for sharing!
Many of tbe Firestorm batteries in the drill packs are only 1.0 amps. The two pack with drill and bag from Walmart has 1 amp batteries, so the Harbor Freight is an upgrade at 1.3a. Someone online figured out number stamped near the battery lock provides date and capicity code for Firestorm 18v. First, you have manufacturing year and week along with some letters. And then there is three digit number, which tells you cell manufacturer (first digit) and capacity (two last digits). If last two digits are 10 it is a 1 amp, if 15 it is a 1.5 amp, etc. I confirmed this by ooening up pack and checking capacity on cells.
Excellent demonstration. Very encouraging. Swapping battery banks is easy once one knows how to do it. Your video helped bypass years of trial and error. It would have been better to fold and pinch some 600v electricians tape over the red connection to unsure there is no shunt.
Mr. Inquisitive rocks! I Learned from the presentation and appreciate his cantor and demeanor. My situation is that I have a dual charger that shows bred pilot lights when the battery packs are inserted but have not turned after more than 24 hours. I suspect that the charger is working fine but the batteries are damaged. I'm hoping to how to refurbish the dead batteries. I have a trickle charger and saw a video where the gentleman use a daisy chain method with 12v batteries an arched the leads a certain number of times to realign celluar structure and then placed them on a trickle charge bringing the batteries back to full charge... Holla!🔁
The battery they sell now has different wiring but I was able to make it work. Also, the wires on the Black and Decker are 16 gauge and on the new battery are 18 gauge. I decided to replace them with 16 gauge.
I did this awhile back. It went just as Richard said it would. The Harbor Freight battery had a charge and ran my drill for a couple of minutes, but then I put it on the charger. It charged fine and worked perfectly the next time I used it. I left the battery on my drill overnight. When I went to use it the next day, the battery was totally dead and would not even consider taking a charge. I hooked up two other 18v batteries in series and zapped this one. That brought it back to about 16v whereupon I put it on the charger. It charged fine and worked fine. The next time after that when I went to use it, it was totally dead again. It tested about 3v. I zapped it with two other batteries exactly like before. Bigger sparks than before. Now it showed about 2.6v. It lost voltage with the zapping. Hmmm. I also noticed it had welded together the lips of one of my little alligator clips in my in-series battery hookup. Nothing now gets it to charge. I took the battery case apart hoping to find my hot and neutral wires touching--not really that I wanted them to touch but at least it would indicate the problem. Everything was fine. The wires to the connectors were still taped with electrical tape and still separated. No wires were pinched. There was no metal in the case coming into contact with any parts. The soldered wires seemed to be solidly joined although I did not take off the electrical tape to see them. Since the battery had a good charge when I rebuilt it, I'm thinking the problem was me. Is it because I used it just a little before putting it on the charger? It was still running healthy when I did put it on. Could it be the electrical tape? A telephone serviceman once told me, I now remember, that electrical tape is terrible because it draws moisture. Can anyone help me?
Just saw this 8 years after you posted. Great idea... I just hope you haven't since burned your house down from not having put a shrink tube over the joint in the two wires you spliced. The pos & neg are just laying loosely together, about 1/2" apart, uninsulated - accident waiting to happen.
Consider picking up a Belkin Conserve Socket F7C009 for $10 on Amzn. It has a 3 hour and and 6 hour setting. I put it on the 3 hour first, then flip it to the 6 hour for a second period and then the battery is good to go. NiCads sensitive to overcharging so a timer like this extends their life...
When I opened my Black and Decker HPB18 battery it had two white wires as well as the flat metal tab attached to the bottom of one of the batteries. It was definitely a HPB18 battery. Got any ideas about how to wire the new Harbor Freight 68860 to my Black and Decker???
interesting video. My question is- do the harbor freight/ chicago electric batteries, which are now in the B& D case, hold the charge any longer then the original B & D batteries? thanks
Gracias! real helpful 👍🏻. Is HF battery pack a long lasting and reliable battery or is there a better source for long lasting battery pack that you know of ? Thank you again.
Aren't the thermal temperature sensors you removed from the Harbor Freight battery pack compatible with the Black & Decker quick chargers with that feature?
I am not sure if in my case its the battery. First ive put them in the charger. When I checked later the charge gave a green light yet when I wanted to do my drilling job nothing happened. On the drill it battery check button it shown no power. Yet again in the charger it shown green light. However pulling the plug and connecting again gave red light. So I gave it another day and the light is still red. But removing the battery from the charger and putting it back in makes the charger shown green light. After that ulling the plug and connecting again makes it a green light. I think its the battery thats dead but could it maybe in stead being the charger thats bad? Strange is that last time ive used the drill all was good and I have not used the drill in months and now all of sudden when I want to use it this happens. Now comes my question what should I do? buy a new battery yet have a change its not the battery but the charger that is the problem? Or dont risk it and maybe buy a new drill?
Hi I have a black and decker cordless drill (CD120G-XE) That is 12v and came with a A9252 12v 1.3amp. Would it be ok to use a A9262 14.4v 2.0a battery and give it a bit more grunt. Im not too worried if it will shortened the drills life it doesn't get used much but the current batteries are stuffed and in it needs a bit more power in my opinion
Pick up a Belkin Conserve Socket F7C009 and you can be sure you won't overcharge your batteries and shorten their life. It has a 3 hour and 6 hour setting so I run each battery once on each (actually have two chargers ganged into the timer, so two batteries get charged) and the batteries are good to go after the 9 hours. Nice to see Radio Shack helping hands! Sold a lot of those back in the day as a RS store manager at the end of the CB boom, start of the TRS-80 period. Company lost its way and no one is DIY these days so sad to see them fold.
Great idea !-but here in the UK these batteries have 3 connectors & the live is on the left,the middle is not used & the right is neutral.-different to yours.Another I just bought,the live is on right & neutral on left[prob made in China] but these are £13 -miles cheaper than the B&D one. Also my old charger wont charge some of these generic batteries.its a minefield of confusion for me!!
Great, thanks for the video. I have the B&D Firestorm 18v. drill also, it came with 2 batteries, both now are dead. Have been looking at buying new battery packs, but 2 battery packs cost the same as the whole drill did. About $35./$40. each in July 2016. - I was on the verge of taking one of them apart to see what was in there and if I could rebuild them myself. You saved me a lot of work, thanks! :-) ~ I was in WalMart the other day and saw that B&D drill w/ 2 of those same 18v. batteries in it for $50. - I'm headed to WalMart today to buy one ... going to take the easy way out! - Thanks again! I also have a 12v. B&D drill with 2 dead battery packs ... going to have to look into fixing it too, it's next. Have you done one of those yet?
FYI: I was in WalMart about a week or 10 days ago & they had about 5 of those drills on the shelf. I went today and bought the *last* one they had. Hope they get more in stock. - Aug. 3, 2016
of your 12 old cells there is usually 1 or 2 failures that makes the whole unit bad, Chargr them independantly and keep the winners rebuild that set too.
Get in touch with the size details of your traction battery box (Height, width and length), the voltage and some picture if you can and we will send out a no obligation quote.
I did this and it was a total loss of money. I bought 2 of these batteries from Harbor Freight and after wiring everything up correctly, the batteries only held a charge for about as month. after the initial month, the batteries full charge was at lower and lower volts. I have had real bad luck with things from harbor freight and these batteries were total duds. They cannot be returned because they were taken apart! So you are REALLY risking losing your money like I did. For those of you who have used the Harbor Freight batteries; are you getting a normal 3-4 year lifespan out of them? Or are they dying permanently after a few months?
Not saying this isn't a neat idea, but - I just bought 2 new Topbatt 3.0 ah batteries for $40 with free shipping. The Topbatts end up being slightly more expensive, but with 3.0 ah versus these at 1.5 ah you end up with twice the battery life. Would be a great idea to try on some of the X brand tools that don't have replacement batts, but with as many companies offering batts for the B+D's as there is, I'd say it's easier to buy new.
Richard it ALMOST like turning back the time machine and bringing your wife into 18 again. You would never want to use any other tool and would be looking fwrd to sc*****ng everything in site. So if I can now get my wife down to Harbor Frt and get the comparable ingrediants retrofit./ Thanks for the inspiration
Im using electrical solder but it doesn't want to adhere to the wires or strip. What am I doing wrong? It has flux built into the solder. I have 2 different kinds and neither one of them will work. Any help would be appreciated.
likely not enough heat (wattage of iron, or good thermal contact to transfer enough heat to get it to tin - melt some solder on the tip of iron so you have a molten blob that will help with heat transfer when you make contact with the wires or strip since the blob will make greater contact). If you're sure you have plenty of heat, pick up some flux separate from the solder and apply that first, since it's what lets the solder flow and make contact... good luck
The batteries are likely ran from series and parallel so the neg of one battery will go to the positive of another. If the batteries are all series then one neg goes to the next battery positive and back to neg. If parallel then the positive goes to positive of the next battery.
Are those sub-C batteries? They look too short to be 18650s. Is that an ancient phone on the bookcase behind you? I have a 18V Makita rechargeable, that i want to try & rebuild thank you Do the thermal sensors have a high fail rate? Why did you opt to not include it in the rebuild? Nice workshop, too! 🤓
very good information very carefully done you seem to be concerned about your face being in the picture that is not necessary..... having close-ups of your soldering and your wiring etc are more important..... teaching audio as well as physical movements..... once we see you in the beginning and the intro we know you're pretty... thank you very much
p.s. I recently purchased the BRAND-NEW, in-box, with-charger, with-bits, full-oem-warranty 18 volt (orange) "quantum" with single pack and charger as "open box" for FIFTEEN BUCKS from an ordiinary eBay seller. MANY others have identical postings. I question the financial and time efficiency of rebuilding cheap products. (The drill is FAR inferior to the older, green-cased "Quantum Industrial", lacking two-speed gearbox and absent hammer/drill function, but still adequate for light-duty, living-room duty.)
4:10. I'm not able to separate the cover. I can only separate one side by 1 mm using brute force. I guess I have to use bruter force. A vise, a roofing crow-bar and a 5-lbs hammer to split the cover away from the base. I hate it when 50% of my repair time is used to get to the inside of something, whether it's automotive, kid's toys, or appliances. Somebody should make a rant video about this.
1500 mAh isn't very much. You should be able to get 4.8 or more mAh battery. I think most of that solder smoke is from the rosin, so you probably don't have to worry too much about that. Good video, but a little long. Also, item #68860 is no longer available at HF.
Good video but I never did see you take your own advice and tape or shrink wrap your terminal connections. If for some reason you should drop your drill and your soldered joints come loose, how will you know? This may defeat your whole overhaul of your project! other than that nice video.
Before you try replacing as shown in this excellent video, try recharging them from a lower voltage as shown in a video I have posted. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-W_9cqEQETnE.html
Of COURSE batteries are WAYYY over-priced at amazon! EVERYthing on amazon is over-priced, often MASSIVELY so. eg. eBay's got NUMEROUS postings for TWO hbp18-compatible 3300 mAH packs for US$25.00. They're WAYY better than the OEM batteries and FARRR less costly than the nearly FOURTY US bucks U.S. for the 18 "subc"-sized NiCD cells required to rebuild the same pair of OEM batteries.
