Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charging

[sam_sam_sam]

Here we go again with tool battery pack chargers not wanting to charge because of one bad 10uf@50 volt capacitor and a 47uf@50 volt questionable ESR value

10uf = 1.3 new 0.34
47uf = 0.25 new 0.35

The two capacitors replaced between the transformer and the heat sink

A couple of days ago I put a battery on to charge and the red LED light was on when I went to go put the battery in the tool yesterday the fuel gauge showed one light out of four so I said what the hell is going on here the LED light is red or green it is not on at all so I open it up and checked the two capacitors that have gone bad on another Milwaukee battery charger I have same exact model so I been through this crap before but this one has lasted the longest time this is one of first battery chargers when they first start having the the “M” series I still have some of “V” series the ones that were nicad batteries

One note on the “M12” battery pack these batteries are not the best batteries because the majority of them are made Korea and there quality is hit and miss some time they last for a long time and some of them only last a year or so the cells become unbalanced and the charger does not know how to deal with them and become useless if you try to put new batteries in it they will not charge correctly for some reason which I have not been able to figure out what is the issue with them but I think it has to do with the protection board in the battery

[stj]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

pictures pls - not seen in a milwauki one yet!

[sam_sam_sam]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

pictures pls - not seen in a milwauki one yet!

I just post the pictures of it if you need to take a picture of the bottom of the board I will but the small board that is for the “M12” battery pack board is a pain to put back on it two plastic post

[stj]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

oh shit - that construction looks a lot like the Riobi ones i fixed.

[sam_sam_sam]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

oh shit - that construction looks a lot like the Riobi ones i fixed.

Yes it is very similar but not exactly the same though

[redwire]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

It's got a pound of glue inside, going brown at the snubber I would scrape that off before it conducts more.
I would just shotgun it, replace all the electrolytics.

I thought these chargers get hot for a short time, so it is not heat but the 10uF and 47uF parts are not that stressed out- unless that heatsink is too hot?
Or are these simply cheap caps? This Milwaukee charger looks like a cheaper build.

I hear many American companies go to china to get products made there for cheap, and they screw up. If you don't specify everything in the documents, such as quality and lifetime, temperature etc. the chinese will swap in the cheapest parts they have, undersize the caps etc.

[stj]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

they use shit like JWcon

[sam_sam_sam]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

Captions or something similar in name they are shit capacitors when I see them I replace them I did not have a 470uf@50 volts to replace the big one so I did not replace any of the other ones I will keep using the way it is until quite-s again I have several of them and like I mentioned before this is first one that I bought

I have it in my garage on a table where I can charge batteries that I use for work so I not very concerned about it taking a shit again then I will probably give it a total recap

[dmill89]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

oh shit - that construction looks a lot like the Riobi ones i fixed.

Yes it is very similar but not exactly the same though

Ryobi and Milwaukee are both made by TTI (with Milwaukee being wholly owned and Ryobi licensed, AEG is TTI as well, and "orange" Rigid power tools while owned by Emerson Motor are also made by TTI by contract) so it isn't too surprising that there are some similarities.

[ratdude747]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

Taking notes. I have this exact charger at home... for the one 18V drill I have. Nothing 12V yet... But no issues either.

[redwire]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

Problem is the capacitors failing can then cause the SMPS IC/mosfet to blow up. It's like an auto-destruct just outside the warranty period.

I can't believe these cordless drills/chargers are all the same mega-conglomerate TTI sales of $10B in 2020, 26% growth in Milwaukee professional sales.
They couldn't spend $1 extra on these parts to keep the brand name decent?

[dmill89]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

Problem is the capacitors failing can then cause the SMPS IC/mosfet to blow up. It's like an auto-destruct just outside the warranty period.

I can't believe these cordless drills/chargers are all the same mega-conglomerate TTI sales of $10B in 2020, 26% growth in Milwaukee professional sales.
They couldn't spend $1 extra on these parts to keep the brand name decent?

Even "premium" tool brands have different "grades" of tools and chargers, I don't have any Milwaukee cordless stuff (only corded), so I can't comment on if some of their chargers are better built than others, but I have a bunch of Makita stuff and 2 different models of their chargers, the standard DC18SD that they throw in with every kit (or about $35 if you buy it separately), and the "top of the line" DC18RD dual port rapid charger which lists for $120 all by itself (more than the entire $99 "entry level" Makita 18V drill kit), though I got it with one of the "deals" before Christmas last year and didn't pay anything for it specifically (included with a bundle). Which have a significant difference in both cap selection and overall build quality.

The Makita DC18SD "standard" charger:

Kind of lightly built, but it only needs to handle a 2.6A charge rate so it should be fine.



Caps from Aishi and Samaxon, not the worst, but not the best either

now the Makita DC18RD dual-slot rapid charger:

Much beefier, but it needs to be to handle a 9A per slot charge rate, it also looks like they just threw 2 chargers in one housing to make a "dual port" charger.


Caps all from Nippon Chemi Con and Rubycon



and active cooling as well.

[sam_sam_sam]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

The dual charger is not exactly the same for each side on the left side of the charger has output capacitors however the charger board on the right hand side does not have the three output capacitors

[dmill89]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

The dual charger is not exactly the same for each side on the left side of the charger has output capacitors however the charger board on the right hand side does not have the three output capacitors

They both have the output caps, they are just hidden by the battery slot on one side due to the angle of the picture. The only thing "shared" between the 2 sides is the input filtering.

[redwire]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

It looks like two identical charger boards. For the $120, on a jobsite I'd say it's well worth it. The cooling fans are just over the top lol, how many watts is this, 820uF primary cap too is huge. 9Ax18V= ~162W each in a flyback?

You have mega-conglomerate TTI having to map out each "brand" and what quality and price niche each one is boxed into.

[sam_sam_sam]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

They both have the output caps, they are just hidden by the battery slot on one side due to the angle of the picture. The only thing "shared" between the 2 sides is the input filtering.

How well do the batteries hold up in the Makita tools

The reason I as is the Ryobi charger are getting really shit-e with the way the new ones are they have the switching power supply adapter separate from the charging circuit but switching power supply is crap the case gets very warm and does not charge as fast as the older ones did

[dmill89]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

How well do the batteries hold up in the Makita tools

So far I haven't had any issues, though my oldest battery is only around 4 years old. I haven't really had any issues with any of the Li-Ion powered tools I have. In addition to Makita, I have some 12V Bosch, 20V DeWalt (old 18V NiCad tools with the adaptor to take the 20V Li-Ion batteries), 20V Bauer (harbor freight), and 12V Craftsman Nexxtec (old Sears era Craftsman made by TTI), though with the exception of the 12V Craftsman which is around 10 years old (Sanyo Cells in this), the others are all less than 3-4 years old.

I had plenty of issues with batteries back in the NiCad days (even the expensive DeWalt XRP stuff), they never seemed to hold up if they were regularly left siting for extended periods of time and I often only got a couple years out of batteries.

[sam_sam_sam]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

Well the other battery charger took a shit yesterday it was telling me that the new 12 battery for the new drill I had to buy new one because the battery fuel gauge board has malfunction and all 4 lights keep blinking and the tool light will not go off by itself

The battery charger would still charge the 18 volt batteries but not the 12 volt one
Found a 10uf @50 volts 0.98 ESR value new 0.38 ESR value the 47uf @ 50 volts 0.68 new one 0.38 ESR value the rest of the capacitors were not quite as bad but Capton brand and a couple of them looked like they were possibly starting to leak

Now the charger is charging the 12 volt batteries again WOW saved $90.00 from having to buy a new one

One note the Milwaukee tools that is sold at Home Depot has changed there warranty program no other place that sells Milwaukee brand tools will no longer fix them ( now they offer a replacement plan for two years for $18.00 which I purchase because I have had issues with some tools that I had to be fixed under warranty before )

I think I have one more older version still with the original capacitors in it but I do not use that charger very often but I might start using it so it can take a crap as well so it can get recapped

When you buy a M12 tool the tool only has the ( M12 ) 12 volt charger only I have several of them that I only use when I not a home and do something on location

[redwire]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

I would not have replaced those based on ESR, it still looks reasonable? I measure their capacitance as well. I wonder about the bigger output caps too. Maybe the heat is too much for the smaller parts.
Were the old caps CapXon brand? I had to laugh they were on the HK stock exchange and got de-listed for the usual corruption and cooking the books. Absolute garbage capacitors, across the board.

[CapLeaker]

Re: Milwaukee Battery Charger M18/M12 Dual battery charger Dead no light during charg

I am thinking too that the elevated ESR shouldn’t have influenced the circuitry yet. Sure, they aren’t like new, but these measurements should have been ok on a cold capacitor. If the cap was hot and had these readings, well… that would be going in the bin.