Lawn mower batt upcycle?

[amanise]

I've ended up with a pretty powerful rechargable battery and charger from when my MacGregor lawn mower bit the dust in the spring. Rather than chuck it at the tip, I was wondering if there would be any way to turn it into a rechargable power supply and use it like a power bank.

I have no idea what I'm doing and imagine the whole thing could be quite catchy firey. Any advice from electrobods?

[adrian_k]

It might be worth a trawl through eBay or Amazon to see if there is an adapter for that battery. I bought one for my Makita battery that provides a 12v barrel type socket and 2 5v USB A sockets. I use it all the time to power my Boss cube street amp.

[amanise]

It might be worth a trawl through eBay or Amazon to see if there is an adapter for that battery. I bought one for my Makita battery that provides a 12v barrel type socket and 2 5v USB A sockets. I use it all the time to power my Boss cube street amp.

Good idea! It fits into its charger via a sliding 'shoe' affair and clips in. The contacts are spade type jobbies that slide into accepting slots in the shoe. To take power off it, I'd need to mimic the shoe on the mower which was presumably hooked up to the motor via the handle switch. Is there a generic name for these type of sliding plug and socket assemblies that the manufacturers would order in to make them?

[tacitus]

When I was experimenting with battery power for phono stages and the like, I bought the charging connector and rewired it to make a strimmer battery into a 12 or 15 volt power source. This was a little unit for Black and Decker; I don’t suppose you csn get similarly small ones for mower batteries at 40 volts or so.

Might be worth a look on eBay or Amazon for knock-off chargers that might be able to be converted into power-out devices. I wouldn’t rate your chances of getting just the clip, new, in quantities of less than x-thousand.

Another way might be to source a whole, dodgy, mower from Gumtree or FB marketplace to get you something to hack about …

[Nazard]

I have no idea what I'm doing and imagine the whole thing could be quite catchy firey. Any advice from electrobods?

In which case I would urge a great deal of caution! A 40volt lithium-iron battery contains a great deal of energy when charged. Apart from the danger of fire etc., I regard any voltage over 12v as potentially hazardous, particularly when it can deliver a substantial amount of current.

[Folderol]

I have no idea what I'm doing and imagine the whole thing could be quite catchy firey. Any advice from electrobods?

YES!
Don't do it!

There are far too many ways it could go wrong. Cover the terminals and get it to a recycle point.

[amanise]

Hmmm. Food for thought

[resistorman]

EGO battery systems have inverters in their lineup, I have a couple and they're very handy. Maybe your company does too.

[James Perrett]

Is there a generic name for these type of sliding plug and socket assemblies that the manufacturers would order in to make them?

I think manufacturers tend to make them slightly different so that you have to buy their matching battery packs.

As others have said, if you don't know what you are doing then don't even think about trying to re-use the battery. They need very careful handling.

[Sam Spoons]

The battery docks on power tools are manufacturer specific and some like Makita vary according to the voltage and even the generation*. But 3rd party Makita battery adapters are easily found on Amazon and presumably the other big names too but I doubt you'll find one for MacGregor.

* My 18V Makita tools use two different battery docks, the more recent version is back compatible with my (older) drills but the old batteries won't work with my new angle grinder.

[amanise]

Well, all in all it sounds like it was a dodgy idea. So I'm glad I didn't just hook it up to something to see what happened. I shall do as Will and James suggested and take it to the tip. Thanks all!