How to charge hand tool batteries in van

[SSHandyman]

Howdy!

I am starting a handyman business and need to set up a charging station in my Sprionter van. I would like to have an outlet strip mounted so I can plug in five or six hand tool battery chargers  What is the best way to do this? 

Much thanks!

 

[John61CT]

Use 12V DC chargers

 

[highdesertranger]

2 ways,

1. inverter to use the 120v charger.

2. 12v charger. by far the better way to go.

I started standardizing my tools a few years back so that they all use the same battery. I gave away or sold all my odd ball stuff, this made it much easier. highdesertranger

 

[WanderingBiker]

Use 12V DC chargers

where would I look for the 12v dc chargers.. I searched around a bit, but they always come up 115v to 12vdc.... havent found a direct 12v charger yet..

 

[highdesertranger]

what brand tools do you have? highdesertranger

 

[John61CT]

Ridgid is the only difficult one AFAIK

 

[frater secessus]

where would I look for the 12v dc chargers.. I searched around a bit, but they always come up 115v to 12vdc..

Try googling the product and "car charger" or "auto charger" instead of "12v charger".  That gets around the problem of missing results because hand tools run on 19v or whatever.

 

[John61CT]

Also vehicle charger

 

[bullfrog]

One of the reasons I went with the Ryobi 18 volt "One" system is every thing can use the same big battery that can be charged by a vehicle plug in style 12volt source charger in less than 4 hours.

 

[WILD@HEART]

Good tips shared...Been considering replacing some tools and transitioning to line of cordless power tool kit and accessories (Ryobi/dewalt/ rigid), theyre light weight, compact, new, lithium batteries are also interchangable and streamlined and convenient,prices are reasonable, especially if you catch a sale. There's a freedom with portability you cant get with a cord...plus you can go from power tools to accessories (lights/fan/usb radio/hand vac/ etc). Lithium batteries and LED's rule, but there's always room for the old reliables(corded power tools. Whatever works for your needs, wants and budget  BTW home depot has bought out & owns a few of these brands...

 

[Oneleggedcowboy]

Beware, modified sine wave inverters eat battery chargers!

 

[tx2sturgis]

There are still a few good reasons to use a nice sine wave inverter:

You already have the plug-in 120v chargers, and,

Any new rechargable or corded tools you buy locally will plug in and work right now, no delay trying to find a 12v car charger.

If the inverter is hard-wired to the battery, and a good 120v power strip is plugged in to that inverter, you will have no trouble with the plugs, compared to the typical 12v car power ports which are often troublesome, especially the multiple power socket contraptions.

If you buy a large capacity inverter, it will directly power lots of power tools, plus soldering guns, laptops, blenders, work lights, radios, hair trimmers, tv's, whatever. Those same tools can be carried into a jobsite, home, whatever, and plug right in. You wont have to carry and keep track of two or more sets of chargers for every tool.

Inverters also have low voltage shutdown protection, which many of the car chargers do NOT have.

In your situation, (handyman earning a living) my vote is to go with a good quality 700 to 2000 watt sine wave inverter.

 

[John61CT]

Whole point here is don't use any stinkin' inverters.

Native DC all the way for the win!

 

[tx2sturgis]

Whole point here is don't use any stinkin' inverters.

Native DC all the way for the win!

I disagree in this case. 

And, even the 'native' DC items we are referring to, invert 12v DC to high frequency AC, then BACK to DC in the boost conversion to ~20v DC for charging.

Inverters still have a place in mobile power work solutions.

Suppose the OP is at a job site, and his client says, hey I need all those fence posts out there in that field sawed in half for a project, and OP says, sure, I'll just go buy a sawzall and do that for ya.

He can go buy a $30 sawzall at Harbor Freight and plug it into the inverter, or a generator, and have the job done in half an hour.

Or, no inverter on board, and now what? Turn down the job? or cut 50, 4" posts with a handsaw? Or hope the little cordless circular saw will work? 

Or tell the client well, sure, I'll go order a cordless sawzall, and the car charger for it, and drive back out here in 2 weeks. Then you end up with a cordless sawzall and 2 chargers, AC and DC, and a couple of batteries, all costing MUCH more than the job paid, and then the stinkin sawzall batteries go bad after some period of time from non-use.

Just an example....it's not hard to think of other situations where an inverter could be useful.

But, at any rate, it's up to the OP of course.

 

[SSHandyman]

Where is the delete button?

 

[SSHandyman]

At this point I am not interested in powering tools in the field although that would be awesome one day.

Right now I just need to power up hand tool batteries. I have four round non-led lights hanging on the walls. I disconnected them and the wires are hanging there waiting to be used. I may reinstall them after rerouting them to different locations. The other two are available for use. I also have a dual 12v outlet that I am moving a few feet over. 

Will this work???

 

[SSHandyman]

Or this???

 

[tx2sturgis]

I advise you to look for pure sine wave inverters.

Otherwise the tool chargers can get really hot.

 

[bullfrog]

Slow down a little and let us make sure we know exactly what you have and what you want to do. 5 or 6 chargers,what are the voltages and how many amps do they draw? Will you be using them continously, or only with the engine running? Do you have a house battery,generator or solar? If only alternator and starting battery how much power you will use and how often do you want to replace the alternator and battery due to high loads wearing them out should be considered. Do you have 120 power at job sites you could use? I have had good luck using 18 volt vehicle plug in chargers but I usually drive at least 4 hours a day. I do keep a spare vehicle battery charged up just in case but have never had to use it. I usually only charge one tool battery at a time and because all my tools use the same battery I have several spare batteries charged, ready to be used if one goes down while parked. There are lots of different ways to provide power to charge tool batteries we just need more information to be able to let you figure out what will work best for you. There are a lot of cheap solutions that may end up burning up or wearing out some expensive parts.

 

[SSHandyman]

My post was asking how to charge cordless tool batteries. Currently, I have chargers that are 90W, 85W, 85W, and 15W = 275W (probably wouldn't use more than two of those simultaneously). I only have my car battery and alternator. If a small 500W 12V DC to 120V inverter is all I need, such as the one in the picture, then great.  If that is detrimental to the car battery then that's not good. I am willing to get an auxiliary battery but then I might as well set up for powering tools which means I need a pure sine wave inverter, right?  My most power sucking tool is the compound miter saw at 1680W, so I'd need an inverter to also handle that.

I am new to all this electrical stuff so please speak like Bob in his tutorials....like its an Inverter 101 course.

Thanks