Project Date:
November 16, 2006
A local recycling drop-off location also accepted batteries. I was dropping some old alkalines when I saw a green light start glowing in the drop-off bin. I dug down into the pile of old batteries and pulled out about twenty MacBook battery packs that still showed full charge (according to the little green lights).
I took them home and opened one up to see that the lithium ion cells were 18650 style. The battery on my laptop hadn't worked in months so I decided to swap the dead cells out of my current laptop pack with the ones from the salvaged MacBook packs. With some careful soldering, I was able to swap the cells.
The loss of power reset the microcontroller on the battery pack so it assumed that the cells were brand new. After a few discharge/recharge cycles, it leveled out at about 80% of the packs rated charge. Not bad!