Bosch Uneo External Battery Modification

jarvist

New member
I just modified another Bosch Uneo for bolt climbing use this summer, and took a good few photos of the pristine gearbox + my modifications, to help anyone else that decides to get one themselves.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jarvist/sets/72157627025564123/

I choose to remove the internal lithium ion batteries entirely, and put it on a ~1.3m extension lead so you can directly use a battery in a SRT bag clipped to your chest harness without any extra leads.

The reason I'm having to do another is that our first Uneo died an unlikely death, possibly after being wired up backwards to the battery. Certainly something is wrong with the logic board, it's too clever by half. Drills should not have a 'Software Version'!
We also had a very irritating issue last summer in our 1C caves where the drill would refuse to run off cold NiMh batteries, instead just lighting up the 'low battery' red LED and refusing to put any juice into the motor.

The obvious thing to do is hot wire the blessed thing, which is what I intend to do with our 'broken one'. It's slightly complicated as the MOSFET to drive the motor is on the big PCB and the usual variable speed control has extra leads (again, going to the PCB!). If I succeed in driving a stake through it's over protective brain I'll report back here on such a positive modification. I thought it was a complicated (to drive) brushless motor, but this is not true.

So, overall the Uneo is pretty finicky (if you're not familiar with them, they also have odd and not widely available SDS-quick bits), but you can't get a lighter, or more pleasing to hold 1-handed & outstretched, drill for love nor money, and certainly not the ?60 or so that you can pick up an 8mm-'concrete bit' Uneo for.

A load of people on ukcaving + a Spanish caver I found on Youtube were really helpful when I did this for the first time last year, but I can't remember their names off the top of my head!
 

jarvist

New member
sluka said:
jarvist said:
the drill would refuse to run off cold NiMh batteries
Sorry, but why you don't use the LiIon pack?

We didn't have any sensible way to charge them, and the 2.4Ahr (?) capacity of the tiny 18650 cells seemed a bit trivial to bother making them into external batteries. The substitution, on expedition, was simply to use our alternative 5Ah 12V lead acids. Their voltage goes up as the temperature drops.
This year we also have a 12-cell (14.4V nominal) NiMh Sub-C pack made up.

Now that I've got 8 Li-ion cells doing nothing, I might make them up into an external pack and see if I can charge them without them blowing up. On the last Uneo I left the wall-wart connector in, so that one could use the internal circuitry to charge up the Li-ions normally via the external fly leads (but without the temperature sensors doing anything useful...). But it quickly clogged with mud anyway, and seemed to let a lot of dust into the drill body.

Skua, are you the guy who advised me last year + who had left his internal batteries in, and brought three leads out? (battery +ve, motor +ve, common -ve?) It was a very sophisticated + well thought out way to both internal + external batteries depending on situation. For our use on expedition (charging off Solar PV) and with a mix of cavers who won't necessary understand the electrical subtleties (and could choose to short an external battery to the internal lithiums), I believe making it a wholly battery-less drill is the best solution.
 

jarvist

New member
Just to comment that with a 3.7Ahr 14.4V Sub-C cell battery pack from component shop (?30) we were reliably getting 12-15 8mm bolt holes (at almost the full length of the SDS-quick 8mm drill bit the Uneo comes with), in our 1-5 degrees C warm cave environments.
This seems considerably more efficient for bolting than other, larger & more powerful, drills we've used.

Off 5Ahr lead acids (which are nice and nearly cuboid) we were getting ~10 bolts, though there was still charge left in the battery -- the voltage had just got too low for the Uneo to play.

We also found that you could warm up a battery (such as the lead acids after a couple of bolts had been taken out of them) when the Uneo was complaining that the voltage was low + cutting out:
* drill into space for the ~2s you get before the Uneo cuts out with the red 'low battery' light,
* quickly release and squeeze the trigger to drill for another 2s of drilling,
* repeat until the voltage picks up enough for continuous drilling, then place your bolt.

For next summer's expedition we'll be purchasing some more NiMh batteries from 'component shop', and looking into hot-wiring the broken Uneo.

As it's relatively modestly powered, there shouldn't be any problem with just having a simple 'on/off' switch and a MOSFET to drive the motor.
 

Al.

New member
Einhell makes as similar sized drill to the Uneo that it takes real ADS bits:
<http://www.einhell.com/englisch/englisch.aspx?file=elektrowerkzeuge&lang=en>
What's more, it doesn't have any 'intelligent' hardware in it, so it's easy to hotwire.
They really are very good for bolting, but lack the power of a bigger drill.
 

Al.

New member
From their webpage:

Technical Data
Battery 14,4 V, 1.400 mAh
Max. torque 12 Nm
Idle speed 0-800 min-1
Impact rate 0-4500 min-1
Impact power 1,0 J
Drilling capacity concrete 10 mm
Charging time 3-5 h
Product weight 1,3 kg :)
__________
& that's *with* battery



 

jarvist

New member
sluka said:
Einhell: Weight 3 kg  :confused:
If we're talking about the Einhell Blue BT-HD (thing looks almost identical to an Uneo), that's the logistical, i.e. box, weight. The product weight is 1.3kg.
Which is probably about right if the internals are the same more or less as the Uneo but it has a larger chuck.

However, I'd be very surprised if there was no clever electronics in there, it boasts a variable speed control & integrated battery charging, which is exactly what the Uneo does. Has anyone actually adapted this for caving yet?

At a 'bare drill' list price of 61 Euros it's certainly worth investigating!

I'm not sure if these links will work for long, or at all, but anyway:
1 page PDF English brochure:
http://www.isc-gmbh.info/download/prod/35751538/4513470_01019.pdf
German technical manual showing the battery attachment:
http://www.isc-gmbh.info/download/prod/35751543/4513470_01019_SPK5.pdf
 

jarvist

New member
Just for completeness, here's the Uneo. Technical Data.:
Max. drilling diameter in concrete 10 mm
No-load speed 0?900 rpm
Impact rate 0?4,800 bpm
Single impact force 0.9 J
Impact stop Yes
Forward/reverse operation Yes
Pneumatic hammer mechanism Yes
Battery voltage 14.4 V
Battery capacity 1.3 Ah
Charging time 3 h
Battery charge level indicator Yes
Weight including battery, approx. 1.1 kg
Carrying case Yes
 

Al.

New member
"Has anyone actually adapted this for caving yet?"

Yes

The supplied battery pack is pathetic. Good for 5-7 spits.

I cut off the front part of the handle that only houses the battery pack and fitted a power cable. I've run it on a variety of lithium battery packs and even a 12 V SLA by accident. It ran a little slow, but was still faster than hand-drilling the spit.

So far it's done ~150 spit holes and a few minor shot holes.

It drills slower than my old 12 V Makita, but it really isn't a big deal spending 30 seconds instead of 15 seconds to drill a bolt hole. It's under half the weight and size.

A nice exploration caving toy.

I've also seen a Chinese clone in red plastic bearing 'Taurus' stickers instead of 'Einhell'
 

jarvist

New member
The SDS-plus makes it interesting indeed!
Mind you, the Uneo 8mm SDS-quick concrete bits are really nice for 8mm rawls, and it makes the overall length of the drill + bit really quite short, which is useful for bolting in rifts.

Is there a UK supplier for this Einhell drill?

The Uneo's RRP may be ?129.99, but it's typically available for ?60-90.
 

hrock

New member
when i did mine i managed to get a lead from the battery's out of the air vent in the handle then fitted the power in plug to come out the charging plug hole. it means i can run it on my 12v mnhi packs or 14.4 lopo packs and it can still be used for bits and bobs and the odd bolt on its internal batterys.

but there is no need now

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0047O2AR6/ref=s9_simh_gw_p60_d5_g60_i1?pf_rd_m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=1JPPE82CN5A7MBQEYJBR&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=467128533&pf_rd_i=468294



 

Roger W

Well-known member
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