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Rebuilding battery packs

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bluethunder

Experienced Member
Joined
Jan 5, 2010
Messages
209
Location
Calgary, Alberta
I've got a couple old laptops with toast batteries. Replacement batteries cost the same as a used P4 laptop...:confused:

I've opened the case on one, and it just has a bunch of super sized "AA looking" NiMh batteries in it.

Is there any where to buy these with Tabs, so I could solder them together to make a new pack?

Has any one rebuilt a battery pack before?
 
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Sure, it's not only possible, but easy! Search eBay or the likes for 4/3A batteries. You can usually get higher capacities than the originals which means your laptop will run longer on a charge. Do get the batteries with pre-welded tabs, as soldering to the tops can ruin the gas vent and cause battery leaking/exploding! I've rebuilt several 386/486/Pentium laptop batteries this way with 100% success.
 
Other/smaller battery packs can also be a good source for the cells to rebuild a hard to find or expensive pack.

I got lucky a while back and happened into the local radio shack when they had just decided to liquidate a whole pile of 3 and 4 cell battery packs for obsolete cordless telephones. So far I've managed to make new packs for a couple of my laptops out of them, for no more than a few dollars each.
 
Hi
One should be careful about using old batteries from different sources.
Ones with different capacities will cause one to over charge some of the
cells, resulting in quicker failure.
If rebuilding, it is bets to get cells from some of the ebay sources and
replace all the cells at once.
I've use one of these sources for NiCads with good luck.
Also make sure you know what type of battery cell you need.
You can't mix them.
Like someone else said, unless you have a spot welder, get them
with solder tabs.
Dwight
 
If you have a "Batteries Plus" store in your area, I'd recommend taking the pack to them and letting them do the rebuild. It's not that much more expensive than if you do it yourself.
 
I've got a few vintage and non-vintage laptops I'd like to do this for (one of which is used for work on a weekly basis, as I need to run XP-era software, but need a serial port, so the old 750mhz Duron laptop does fine - but would be nicer/easier if I had a battery pack with it again)

Given say, a 6-cell battery, how would one go about arranging them to work again? I guess I'm specifically asking how to wire them for series, for parallel, or whatever's typically needed for a laptop rechargable battery. (obviously from my asking this question, one can assume that I have zero to no knowledge of this and am looking to learn)

Thanks!
 
Chuck(G) said:
If you have a "Batteries Plus" store in your area, I'd recommend taking the pack to them and letting them do the rebuild. It's not that much more expensive than if you do it yourself.
Click to expand...

+1 ... I've had very good experiences at Batteries Plus. Haven't needed their services in the last year or two, but the expert at the Parsippany, N.J. store was a guy named "Maven" .... no joke! That was a good omen!

Any decent R/C hobby shop could also build battery packs.
 
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