In our modern world full of planned obsolescence helping to fuel cycles of consumerism, the thing that really lets companies dial this up to the max is locked-down electronics and software. We all know the key players in this game whether it’s an automotive manufacturer, video game console producer, smart phone developer, or fruit-based computer company of choice, but there are some lesser known players desperately trying to make names for themselves in this arena too. Many power tool manufacturers like Milwaukee build sub-par battery packs that will wear out prematurely as [Tool Scientist] shows in this video.
Determining that these packs don’t actually balance their cells isn’t as straightforward as looking for leads going to the positive terminal of each. The microcontrollers running the electronics in these packs are hooked up, but it seems like it’s only to communicate status information about the batteries and not perform any balancing. [Tool Scientist] tested this hypothesis through a number of tests after purposefully adding an imbalance to a battery pack, first by monitoring i2c communications, measuring across a resistor expected to show a voltage drop during balancing, let a battery sit 21 days on a charger, and then performing a number of charge and discharge cycles. After all of that the imbalance was still there, leading to a conclusion that Milwaukee still doesn’t balance their battery packs.
Giving them the benefit of the doubt, it could be that most packs will be just fine after years without balancing, so the added cost of this feature isn’t worth it. This video was put out nearly a year ago, so it’s possible Milwaukee has made improvements since then. But a more realistic take, especially in a world dominated by subscription services and other methods of value extraction, is that Milwaukee is doing this so that users will end up having to buy more batteries. They already make user serviceability fairly difficult, so this would be in line with other actions they’ve taken. Or it could be chalked up to laziness, similar to the Nissan Leaf and its lack of active thermal management in its battery systems.
Thanks to [Polykit] for the tip!
