Do inverters destroy power tool batteries?

It depends on the sine wave that your inverter supplies and the tolerance of your tool.

A pure sine wave will cause no problems but not all inverters supply clean power in this way. Many supply a modified sine wave and are not really suitable for charging some power tools, or other, rechargeable equipment.

Certain rechargers for small nickel-cadmium batteries can be damaged if plugged into an inverter. In particular, two types of appliances are susceptible to damage:

* Small, battery-operated appliances such as flashlights, cordless razors and toothbrushes that can be plugged directly into an AC receptacle to recharge.
* Certain battery chargers for battery packs that are used in some cordless hand-tools. Chargers for these tools have a warning label stating that dangerous voltages are present at the battery terminals.

I found out the hard way but luckily the tool was under warranty and the manual did not mention this, some do.

Paul
 
Switch mode PSUs should be ok. These are readily identified because they are very light. Seem to have nothing in them at all. They are also more tolerant of insufficient input voltage since they can usually operate down to 100V ac.

Older 50Hz mains transformer types can overheat due to the high frequency harmonics produced by cheaper inverters which gets lost in the transformer core. Oh, and will be a bit under voltage at output. The old Nokia chargers seem ok. But then I seem to have at least half a dozen of these spare...
 
I tried to use mine to recharge a 28V battery pack on my cordless drill (used for mainsail hoisting) and the inverter shows an overload warning - do I just need a bigger inverter?
 
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