Got a Bosch cordless strimmer with ALL-standard Li-ion battery (an attempt to standardise, adopted by several other manufacturers). Standard is 18v 2.5Ah with charger that recharges from dead in 1hr, but alternative batteries are available - 4Ah and 6Ah. Also bought a non-Bosch spare battery which is 18v 3Ah, same shape, and a lot cheaper.

Now for a pole hedge trimmer. The Bosch one isn't well reviewed, so we may not be able to share batteries/charger with the strimmer. A Gtech one is well reviewed, with different pattern of 18v 2Ah battery as standard but very weak recharging - a 13a plugtop type one with wire to a co-ax plug into the battery - 4hr recharge!

First question - would it be safe, for the battery, to find a stronger plugtop-type charger with same co-ax plug? Or do they only exist in 'weak' rating?

Second - would it be fair to say, as the Bosch hedge trimmer quotes 45min runtime on 18v 2.5Ah battery, the Gtech 60mins on a 18v 2Ah battery, the Bosch's motor must be consuming 3.3A x 18v = 60W; the Gtech 2A x 18v = 36W? That wd be odd, as the Gtech blade is 510mm vs 450mm Bosch, and can cut a 25mm branch vs 19mm. Motor power seems never stated, for cordless garden tools.

Third - first (and only) time I used the non-Bosch 3Ah battery in the strimmer, the motor burnt out, replaced under guarantee - it had actually smoked a bit once before, so was poss an original motor fault. Or is it poss for a (cheaper, non-original) Li-ion battery to deliver xs voltage or otherwise confuse the strimmer's electronics?

Can you spell marketing, Tom?

I'd love to see a genuine battery standarisation take off, but I don't think this is it. It's enough of a problem at the moment to buy a device that has a separate, replaceable battery. I vowed a couple of years ago to never buy any more Bosch garden tools based on their onerous warranty conditions when it comes to a claim. Plus their then and apparently continuing selection of a voltage that won't work with the rest of my tools, let alone the physical package shape. So full marks for the idea, but I'll wait until I see it implemented in a better way. Hopefully soon :)

56v - wow - sounds expensive? pro grade

I see that the Bosch-sponsored ALL-standard battery system is adopted by Husqvarna - but Husqvarna-branded hedge trimers are 48v monsters and expensive. Flymo and Gardena seem to be Husqvarna brands and do use the ALL system for their hedge trimmers, which look same, differing only in colour - but also look same as the Bosch hedge trimmer! So who is making those hedge trimmers and selling them to the other, like the Ford Ka mk2 was all-Fiat Panda under the skin, built in Fiat's Panda factory in Poland.

I'd really appreciate electical guidance on my questions 1, 2 and 3 in 1st post above.

Posted By: PeterStarckWhen I decided to go cordless for all my gardening power tools I chose Ego Power Plus. Their range of tools is very good, from ride on mowers to strimmers, and all run on the same 56V system. I have been using them for several years and don't have any complaints. I think it's a step too far to have a single system for both cordless garden tools and cordless building tools.

I chose Bosch - big mistake. So then I chose Parkside (from Lidl) which has worked out better. The main thing seems to be to buy enough batteries to allow continuous operation and some failures over time (none yet thankfully - the Bosch problem was a motor failure like Tom's backed up by a poor guarantee). But then I have Worx Landroid mower with yet another type of battery.