burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

Five years is a good life for most rechargeable batteries.

You may be able to replace the internal cells, depending on the chemistry used. But it can be a lot of trouble just to save a few bucks.

carl hervol Loc: jacksonville florida

Your lucky it lasted that long I only get about 2 years out of mine that I went to Ryobi I have some 12 years years still take a charge dewalt is nother more than black & decker.

shooter123

Jerry,
Go to batteries plus. I had mine rebuilt at half the replacement cost. Works great.

DickC Loc: NE Washington state

Didn't know they can be rebuilt??

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

Some brands and models of batteries have cases that are easier to open than others. Shops like Batteries Plus have the right tools and experience to do it safely. They also have sources for the bare cells inside many NiCd, NiMh, and LiPo batteries.

You DO have to be very careful, as the cells can explode or start fires if shorted (Think Samsung and their recent failures...).

The Fat Engineer Loc: Scotland

I use Ryobi 18 volt battery tools and most of them are between five and ten years old. Three years ago, one of my batteries from one of the older drills started failing so I looked at replacing it. I also looked at uprating the older batteries to lithium ion for the improved performance and life. Here in the UK, it was actually cheaper for me to buy a new drill with charger and two Lithium ion batteries than it was to buy the batteries by themselves. So I now have three spare unused new drills and chargers which I consider to be free gifts and I replaced six old batteries for; if I remember correctly: 80% of the cost of simply buying six new batteries. As you say about printers and ink, the money is in the batteries with all cordless tools.