>>So NICADs have to be run down to use it properly?
>
>Yup, but not completely dead, but almost drained.

When a Nicad battery is drained it develops an internal short circuit rendering the battery “useless”. In 1974 I developed a way to overcome this characteristic by using a variable source of Alternating Current and making a momentary contact between the AC source and the Nicad terminals. It broke the bond on virtually every Nicad we had that we thought was useless.

It is best to know what you are doing as this could cause an explosion!