Trimble Aftermarket Batteries

Not directly related to your question but I have used aftermarket, knock-off batteries in cordless tools.?ÿ They work fine in the summer, but seem to have slightly less "oomph" in the winter.?ÿ It may just be in my head, though.

Many would question saving $100 on a battery you are going to place in a multiple $1000 dollar robotic total station.?ÿ Only you can answer whether battery leaks, "dirty" current, loss of warranty, etc are worth the savings.

@jaccen

Certainly a good point and thats the reason I hesitate. My instrument is out of warranty at this point, and I'm not worried about a few hundred dollars for batteries, but the batteries currently being sold at my local trimble dealer dont have a trimble logo on them like the ones that shipped with the gun. I'm sure they are equivalent, and that has me thinking I could probably buy the exact same batteries from some other source for 50%. I thought I'd see if other people are doing that with no problems, I certainly don't want to be the guinea pig. 🙂 ?ÿ

What a coincidence. My old OEM batteries for a (not a Trimble) survey instrument are getting too weak to recharge. I was looking at after market, non-oem batteries on the Internet at prices that seemed too good to be true. So, after a discussion with my dealer I decided to put in for the OEM batteries from them instead of taking a chance.?ÿ ?ÿ

Also, I once worked for a guy who was so focused on cheap solutions that he would take the battery packs apart and solder new cells into them. He would glue the battery pack back together and tell the crews to use them. In the end they weren't much better than the dead batteries and the pack became brittle over time by constantly ripping it apart and gluing it back together.

What chemistry and size are the cells?

@not-my-real-name

I had a supervisor that wanted me to rebuild the batteries for a 6-figure surveying instrument myself using parts from Batteries Plus.?ÿ I declined.

Like go scrounge up the few hundred dollars you need from the other office that mostly has us using the machine.

My current bosses understand this and they take care of it.

Too bad they don't make a ZPM in that size.

🙂

Loyal

http://www.batteryrevival.com/

I have used them for batteries from Leica, Sokkia, Trimble, Hemisphere, TDS, and probably a host of others for close to 20 years.?ÿ You ship them your old battery, they fix it, and they ship it back.?ÿ Highly recommended.?ÿ They have both an American and a Canadian shop.?ÿ Arthur has always answered my email within 36 hours.

You may want to explore a similar service in your area if all you want to do is replace old batteries (ie. you do not want to purchase additional batteries).

In cheap power tools, or old gear yes. But I am cheap too.

Recently bought two batteries for about $100, back up GNSS South S82-V, these are Trimble S8 style Li-on batteries.?ÿ Branded batteries $350 EACH.?ÿ The cheap?ÿ are now in rotation with the newer GNSS South G1-s, as the performance is the same as far as tested.?ÿ?ÿ

We had a local battery re packer re cell a few years back, and they were rubbish, lower capacity mah, and poor fit where glued.?ÿ

The firm I work for has almost no equipment budget, so unlikely to ever own Trimble/Leica equipment.?ÿ I would not recommend cheap batteries in a decent total station, unless well tested.?ÿ

We basically only use aftermarket batteries and cables for Trimble replacements. However, there are some items that have to come from Trimble, the battery pack for the TSC2 is one.?ÿ

But for the cowbell, the R8, 5800, 5700, we use the off-brand.

The S6, we were just talking about it, the battery is 2007, 12years old, if you find out that the off-market ones work, I would be interested to know.?ÿ

Posted by: @mightymoe

But for the cowbell, the R8, 5800, 5700, we use the off-brand.

When I bought a surplus, probably never used,?ÿ old Trimble receiver with a cowbell, it contained an Interstate brand battery, understandably pretty dead from sitting in storage. I replaced it with another Interstate and got good service for a year until I let it freeze while run down.?ÿ I have heard a recommendation for the EnerSys/Yuasa/Genesis in SLA batteries, and so far one of them is holding up for me.

@kotuku4

We have the same South gear since 2013 and a year ago the original 4 batteries were getting tired, so we got two new (uprated, so they now give 4 hours rover time as opposed to 3 hours from the originals) batteries from the South supplier, at around $150 each. At the same time I decided to experiment and bought 2 identical batteries of eBay from seller in China, at around $40 each, these last half an hour, so I guess I got less power-time than what I paid for.

BTW, I think to cover the no-ship-lipo issue, the package from China was labeled as "mobile phone" and indeed inside there was a pink plastic non-functional toy phone.

Some years back we bought some off-brand batteries for a Trimble R-8 receiver. They worked great for a couple months, then rather quickly wore out. Nothing truly bad happened, but they really were not worth the hassle in the long run.?ÿ

I'm sure that you can get good quality off-brand batteries that will be as good as the OEM models but if you do they aren't going to be significantly cheaper. And if the are cheaper, they are probably the ones that failed inspection and testing coming off the line. Pass.?ÿ

@bill93

We replace the cowbell battery with interstate, they cost $29 and the worst one I've had gave out after one year, they die slowly so when I start to notice the battery begin to fade I replace it with a spare and order another. The little batteries for the 5700, 5800, R8 normally last a long time, the aftermarket ones are 1/3 the cost of the Trimble ones so we have close to a dozen of them, again as they start to fade replace them. But there are some Trimble batteries you have to get from them. 

I never understood this fiddling about with batteries or any other gear. You buy an instrument that costs $$$ but want to run it on cheap batteries. There are people who use pingpong balls or christmas balls instead of spheres. Wtf

Buy the manufacturer ones. On the lsf forum there was a discussion on this and aven some bloke who wants to replace parts himself in his scanner. Idiots

https://laserscanningforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=15353&p=81091&hilit=batteries#p81091

@richard-imrie

Yes the newer South batteries are 3400mAh verse 2700mAh? for the old ones.

BTNF-L7408W from Surveying TDX via Aliexpress. We paid NZ$ 122.90 at the time.

We get same improvement is base and rover run times.  We were quoted much higher price for batteries.

We do use a SLA for the old base.  Most of our jobs are small G1-s base and rover run fine off the Li-Ion. 

@bill93

I took one apart and posted it here https://surveyorconnect.com/community/surveying-geomatics/re-celling-to-lipo/paged/2/#post-458666  About as simple a re-cell as you could want, just use very high quality small wire as there is no extra space.  With little effort you will get better than stock

Just got a Trimble "camcorder" battery back from Dias & Dias (surveybattery.com). $57, including shipping, for repair/recell.?ÿ New battery from Trimble lists at $120.?ÿ It took less than 2 weeks for them to turn it around.?ÿ

I note that they return shipped it via Canada Post - Air on Nov 21. Which means it spent 10 days of that 2 weeks on board one of Canada's miraculous airmail planes - they sometimes stay airborne for weeks at a time.?ÿ?ÿ

@norman-oklahoma

I have flown out of Pearson Airport before.  While the flight does not take that long, waiting at the terminal seems to.