My Black & Decker 18v cordless drill doesn't charge?

Great tip, I used this on my old black and decker 18v and my Dewalt 18v XRP and it worked on that aswell
Cheers Fellas

Diydude
September 2016

Thanks guys, just found your tip on the web: my problem was with a 12V Cordless B&D drill so just used a 12V car charger directly on battery - worked a dream - thanks for saving me £100 on a new drill!

Brian M.
July 2016

Used said remedy on my 14-4bnd Quattro Battery ,and it worked for mine,. battery now charging worth a try thank you so much

Alan g
March 2016

Thank you - the solutions below worked for me: I was getting the red light coming on for a fraction of a second then going straight to green and not charging! I connected a halford's car battery charger to the poles (unlabeled, so was relying on the charger's polarity check light to let me know if I'd got them the wrong way round). Gave it 20 seconds of charge. Then dropped the battery into the black and decker charger and I got a steady red charging light. It charged fully and now works like a dream. Thank you again!

Sam
March 2015

Brand new 18v B&D drill with two batteries and charger. No volts on the charger whatsoever. Rang B&D - they didn't want to know. Lots of guff about them using third party chargers - not interested. I have a brand new drill which is useless. I metered the charger and there is no output at all.

Chris
April 2014

I think my 18v battery has knackered my charger. How do I test if the battery is faulty, don't want to buy anew charger and then knacker it again..

John
November 2013

Dear Mike....

Legend! It works a treat.

Irish Rover
October 2013

does anyone know which is + and which is - on a PS130 battery?

Alexi
April 2013

Amazing! The "Green" light problem happens from time to time & other times works well until to-day. Connected car charger as Mike said for approx 20secs, put battery back on B&D charger. red light came on and charged up fully.

Thanks guys, great thread.

Lou
January 2013

thanks very much - worked for me - connected + to "key" side and - to rounded side - 20 seconds and now on charger reading red

peter
November 2012

I was almsost out To buy a new bastter but before I bumped into this thread. Charging from car battery for 20 seconds works wonder! Thanks everyone

Irf
July 2012

Hello and what a great website! I have an A18 18V Black and Decker battery, several years old, last charged over a year ago, battery output voltage 5V and charging lights go straight to green. I connected the battery to a 12V (car battery) charger for 20 seconds, the output voltage increased to 12V and charging lights now hold at red while battery is charging. Thanks for everyone's comments especially (in chronological order) JohnB February 2010, Terry Moriarty November 2011 and James April 2012. Regards, Mike.

Mike
May 2012

A14 14.4v Black and Decker that's a few years old has not charging - straight to green all the time - found this site and seem to have made progress;

20secs on a car charger - connected +ve to the connector furthest from the wide slot and -ve to the middle connector.

It's now charging again on the b&d charger or at least it's now in the b&d charger with the red light on.

Will only get back if this doesn't work again.

Many thanks for all the useful help above :o)

James
April 2012

ok i am an electronics engineer,had an erbrauer 14.4v 1.5ah drill for 5 years,with pretty heavy use,left battery charging for a few days,i,d forgot about it,next time i tried to charge no red light,,ok so i had the green,so transformer ok,,i also tested it,,had to file a notch in an old screwdriver to remove base as screws non tamper,tested everything,,all appeared fine,,small black block with red lever??inserted battery,pressed red lever with a pencil,,red light on/charging???was going to make permanent solder joint beneath red lever,,yet as i de-soldered unit ,it corrected itself?so re-fixed red lever 3 pronged switch...either this is a type on thermal device i am unfamiliar with,, or this is a memory type switch, 500 charges then dead ??either way both batterys now at peak performance,,if this helps someone it was worth the time to write bry

brian electronics
March 2012

Same problem with my B&D 14.4V Quattro battery. Put it on charger because it was getting flat. Charger went straight to green light. Connected the battery to a 12v car-battery charger, it went from ~5.5v to ~11v in about 10 seconds. Put it back into B&D charger and bingo, it charges :O)

Terry Moriarty
November 2011

I had the same problem with my Firestorm 14.4 V saw. I opened the unit and found that there was no power from the transformer on the plug. For a quick fix, I connected an old EAGLE RP124 DC laboratory charger providing DC up to 30 V and 15 amp, so more power than ever required for the saw. I made the connection directly to the battery terminals after determining the polarity. There are three 'terminals' on the battery, the one furthest away from the wider slot is the positive and next to it is the negative. Everything appears to have worked perfectly. I set the DC to 15.5 volts and full charge was reached in about one hour.

I must now look for the thermal fuse in the transformer rig, although my new arrangement works well.

Martin Quinn
November 2011

The charger transformer gives a strange output of 21.76v 210/230ma at 6.0va according to the details. The battery is not at fault it's just that when you charge it when it's been heavily drained it'll draw more current in order to charge hence the transformer getting to hot and the internal thermal fuse going into meltdown.
Personly i'd give up on this trouble of a new one that'll just also end in the bin and have a new charger built that will supply a voltage/current regulated charge to the batteries with oh and use a nice hefty transformer of about 24v 500ma should do not sure on the va though but one that's nice n big it'll not get so hot and make a nice little project in itself for those who like to handle a soldering iron
Have fun now.

the thermostat builder
December 2010

My power drill didn't charge anymore...I used another charger and it started charging right away...but now this charger is dead as well. So this means, the batteries in the drill are bad and destroying the chargers? A replacement battery costs more than $20 and I need a new charger now as well...I think a new power drill is cheaper. Can a dead charger be repaired? I opened it, but there's not much inside that looks like it could be repaired.

frank
November 2010

Have had same problem with new charger failing. Have been advised to purchase a voltage reader and if charge of flat battery is significantly below expectations then battery is dying and trying to charge it will probably fry the new charger. Advice from Marshall & Parsons on 01702 481329 who sell slide charger on ebay. Have ordered the newer FSMVC universal B&D charger from Amazon which claims to have thermal protection but only seems to ship from USA for £22 postage PLUS £23 purchase but still competitive at this price.

John F
September 2010

Thank you JohnB
Your solution worked for me!

Bob J
July 2010

If the charger doesn't charge a flat battery (shows a green light as soon as the battery is slid in), connect the battery to a 12 volt car battery for a few seconds, then try charging it again in it's charger. This will usually work! (red light will come on first followed by green light after it's fully charged). If you need to do this every time to charge it, it usually means one or more cells are dying, but at least you can use it until it finally dies. Just jumper a wire from the positive side of the car battery to one of the outside prongs on top of the 18v battery, and a wire from the negative terminal of the car battery to the centre prong of the 18v battery. In other words, connect the positives of both batteries together and the negatives of both batteries together also. You can't hurt the 18v battery this way as the car battery is well below the 18v total of the rechargeable. I think the charger tests the total battery level and if the level is above or below a certain level, it considers the battery to be fully or over charged.

JohnB
February 2010

Just had my charger fail and it was due to the battery.
However I found the fault with the charger to be the 127 Deg C thermal fuse inside the mains transformer. So being a trained electronic engineer I took the transformer to bits and fitted a new re-settable thermal fuse! Not something all will be able to do as it is time consumming but now I won't need to do it again.
So now the charger does not damage its self when a dud battery is fitted. Just got to repaire or replace my battery now!
Why Black and Decker don't fit a re-settable fuse I don't know, but probably cost driven and not the thought of future wasted electronic equipment!

Paul V
January 2010

It sounds as though your Battery is at fault, so do not put any suspect batteries in a new charger or it will happen again!
HHM Authorised Black & Decker Dervice Agent & Spares

HHM WS12 2EH
January 2009

I had 2 18V B&D batteries, neither one would charge, so I got a new charger, that didn't work either. 4 chargers later I worked out one of the batteries blows the charger, the other one is ok. If you are unlucky enough to break 2 chargers then the problem is probably the battery.
If you have 2 batteries mark them and note which one the problem first happened with. Charge the other battery first in a new charger, if that works you know the second battery and the new charger are fine. At this point you can choose to live with 1 battery or take the risk of trying to charge the first one...

JW
January 2009

Black & Decker what more can i say other than get a real drill, if you haven't used it for ages then the battery deteriates hence get a real drill eg..panasonic had mine 12 years still going strong and it has done a hell of a lot of drilling and screwing i can tell ya.

stevey
December 2008

It is either the Power Tool battery or charger. I would try checking each of them separately with another battery and charger.

Don- www.toolsandmachinery.com
September 2008