this post was submitted on 25 Jun 2023
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Most cordless devices have a Lithium-Ion battery in them. For Li-Ion storage you want to keep batteries around 50% charge in a cool environment. This maximizes shelf life. For example a Li-Ion battery stored at room temperature with a full charge loses about 20% capacity per year. At 40% charge (ideal) stored in a cool environment it loses about 5% capacity per year.
If you can remove a Li-Ion battery it's better for storage. Charge to 40% (3.85V measured after resting) and put in a refrigerator. This will put capacity loss under 5% per year. Don't put them in a freezer, that will damage them.
Lead-acid and NiMH batteries have a different ideal storage condition. For 12V lead-acid you want to store them at 100% charge and trickle charge overnight at 13.80V every six months. Store at room temperature. For NiMH you want to charge to full then store at room temperature until needed.
I assume these batteries are lithium ion because it’s all random consumer grade items from e.g., Amazon. I’ll check to see which ones have a battery life indicator on them and charge them all to as close to 40% capacity as I can get. Thank you for the advice :)
Li-Ion batteries are pretty ubiquitous anymore, the majority of devices use them. There's still some that use NiMH. You should be able to look up specs or user manuals for any device to find out the type of battery it uses.
NiMH is actually a better solution as it has much longer cycle life and shelf life. Plus NiMH batteries don't carry the fire hazard of Li-Ion batteries (if you're not educated about that batteryuniversity.com is the place to go for all things battery). Even so there's a huge difference in energy density. NiMH batteries are a lot bigger for the same energy capacity. So engineers seem to be obsessed with battery size over everything else even though NiMH is a safer more robust solution.