Charging Drill Batteries
Charging new Drill batteries can be frustrating. Most people have been told that they should charge their new battery before using it. Some of you already know that trying to charge the battery first does not always work. Depending on how long the battery has been sitting on the shelf is directly related to how much energy is left in the battery pack. Batteries are not shipped fully charged, but they do get an initial charge from the factory to energize the cells and test the integrity of the pack. If you receive a new or recently built battery pack, your charger may not recognize that the battery needs to be charged.
Some chargers, sample the voltage of a battery pack to determine weather or not the pack needs charging and if it see the voltage where it should be like in the case of a freshly manufactured battery pack, it will not start to charge. The charger believes the battery is already at full charge and does nothing or it may light up momentarily and the stop. What is needed is to put the pack into the drill and run it down a little and then try putting it back into the charger. If the charger still will not charge the battery, then you may have a defective charger, but try this first.
Also, the main reason that Drill batteries go bad is they're run down too low before recharging. This will not be the case with a brand new battery. Brand new batteries, right out of the box can be used until you experience a slowing of the drill at which time you should place it on the charger. If you run a battery down continuously over a prolonged period of time, your can cause a polar reversal in some cells, which is why they fail to recharge to their operating voltage over time.
