Posts: 265
Threads: 29
Joined: Jan 1970
Yeah, the hard part is doing just that, opening up the pack without destroying it. Here's what I do...
First: only the ends of the pack are actually bonded together. Don't try to open the pack along its length (other than to cut through the warning labels).
Take a heavy-duty razor blade mounted in a heavy-duty handle (or a #19 X-acto knife blade in the heavy-duty handle, is what I use). Find a corner of the pack that looks like it's the least cleanly put together and force the blade diagonally into the corner with *a lot* of pressure (be very careful not to slip and cut yourself!). The idea is to bury it about 1/16" into the plastic crack formed by the 2-halfs of the pack. Now twist the blade and hope that the pack starts to open up. It does about 50% of the time, if not, either try another corner and/or use the blade to dig into the seam on the ends of the pack and try the corner thing again. Once you get one end of the pack open the other side always just pulls apart.
Battery replacement is obvious if you order the pre-configured pack from Digikey that I suggest in the article. I use Duco Cement to put the plastic back together after replacing the batteries. Of course, I only use the glue on the ends of the pack and I clamp in together for a few minutes until the cement sets.
-Katie