Where are the "mountable" battery chargers?

[Greg Crawford]

I'm on my second cordless drill, a Fein. My first was a Ryobi. I've also worked with Festool, B & D, Dewalt and PC cordless drills and chargers. I've never seen one that was easily mounted to any surface. They're all very light, and the battery packs have to make good contact, so they have a snug fit. You almost always have to use two hands to remove the fresh pack, and some, like my new Fein, it takes two to put the spent pack in as well. Placing them in some kind of cradle can block the cooling airflow, but that's the easiest way to accomplish this. Not the best scenario, which it seems the manufacturers should snap to.

How tough can it be to put some ears on these things so they can be fastened to a wall or a shelf? Does this bother anyone else? Maybe a bug can somehow get into the ear of the makers of these things. Maybe they could even make the lights easy to see from more angles than directly above. Even the cheapest power strip has those keyholes in the back. They're a PITA to try to mount, but at least there's something. Maybe I just expect too much from product designers and marketing departments.

Off to the shop to modify another one.

[glenn bradley]

My DeWalts have a spot for a screw molded in. Look down into the hole where the battery stem goes and you may see one. You just snug the screw enough for the rubber feet to get a grip. You are right that these should be supplied on all these things in an obvious and convenient way. My Makita does not have one at all. My Ridgid does.

[Scott T Smith]

All of my Milwaukee chargers had spots for screw heads moulded into the back of them.

[sean m. titmas]

on some of my chargers i took them apart and used a small length ( aprox 2") of plumbers pipe hanging strap (plastic or metal, i like the plastic) and threaded one end of it on the screws and put the charger back together. one length of strap in each corner and ran a screw through it into a piece of mdf where i had 4 chargers all lined up and plugged into a power strip, also screwed to the mdf. i mounted it on the wall at eye level almost flat against the wall, about 5deg from vertical. that way from across the shop i can see if they are charged full or not.

however, more and more i am wanting to go with pneumatic drills, drivers, screw guns, sanders, etc because i have plenty of air from the compressor and its free (almost).

how many of you guys are using air tools versus batt/cord tools?

[Jamie Smith]

Both my ridgid 18v chargers (three of them ;)) and my shiny-new festool T15 one have keyholes for mounting. Plus, when mounted, the battery would make perfect contact.

(plus, the festool t15 is a sweeeet drill/driver!)

[Lance Norris]

The new Ryobi Green chargers for the Li-ion batteries have 2 keyholes on the back for wall mounting.

[Jim Heffner]

If you are mounting them to shelf, you might want to use a couple of strips of double sided carpet tape on the charger bottom. It is pretty sticky and holds well to everything else, should work here as well! As time goes by, I'm finding more and more uses for that stuff....works well in places where other things can't or won't.

[Prashun Patel]

I screwed a block of 3/4" plywood to the bottom of my makita charger. The block is longer than the charger. Then you can mount the block to anything.

Just be careful where you screw in the charger.

(Screw in the charger?! I just met her!!!)

[Narayan Nayar]

As Jim said, the double-sided carpet tape is great. You need a very flat, smooth surface for it to work well.

I generally just take them apart. Usually you can easily separate the electronics from the bottom base plate. I then drill some holes in that baseplate--either in the bottom or along the back, mount the base to a wall or a piece of wood, then reassemble. Takes maybe 10 minutes.

I take them apart because it's not wise to drill into the base. Too easy to drill into a PCB. Don't ask me how I know this...