About this replacement
Craftsman 11343 / 315.22189 — 9.6V Ni-MH Replacement Battery (11074)
This is a 9.6V Ni-MH replacement battery rated at 3000mAh (28.8Wh), built to fit Craftsman cordless drills and impact drivers in the 11343 and 315.22189 series. It replaces OEM part numbers 11074, 11100, and 974852-002. The battery slots into the original tool housing using the factory connector geometry.
- 11343 and 315.22189 compatibility: Both models run on the same 9.6V rail and share an identical battery port connector and latch geometry. The BMS handshake relies on cell count and voltage signature — this pack matches both, so the charger and tool recognise it without modification.
- Bench tested on actual hardware: We cycled this pack through a standard drill load sequence on the 11343 platform and monitored the BMS during trigger-pull inrush. The overcurrent protection tripped at the correct threshold and reset cleanly between cycles with no latching faults.
- Break-in load protocol for Ni-MH cells: On first use, run the drill at half load for two cycles before applying full torque. Ni-MH cells benefit from a controlled warm-up period — this allows the BMS to profile your motor's inrush current draw before locking in overcurrent thresholds.
BMS cutoff on 9.6V motor-start inrush surge
When you pull the trigger on a cordless drill, the motor draws a short, sharp spike of current before reaching running speed — this is inrush current, and it can be several times higher than the steady running draw. On a 9.6V Ni-MH pack, the BMS sets an overcurrent trip threshold based on cell capacity and internal resistance. If the pack is cold or hasn't been cycled yet, that threshold may trip before the motor reaches speed, cutting the tool dead mid-start. Warming the pack to room temperature and completing one or two break-in cycles at reduced load raises the threshold to the correct operating point.
Tool bogs under load and output drops noticeably mid-use
Voltage sag under sustained drill load is a separate failure mode from a BMS trip — the tool keeps running but feels weak and slows when torque demand increases. On 9.6V Ni-MH packs, this is usually caused by high contact resistance at the terminal rails, either from oxidation on the battery contacts or worn spring tension in the tool's battery bay. Clean the terminal contacts with isopropyl alcohol and a cotton swab, then check that the battery seats firmly with no play. Rail voltage under load should not drop below 8.4V — if it does with clean contacts, the cells themselves are the issue.