This can’t be a real question

The trick is you’re doing it backward. For a lot of tools, the cheap tools aren’t much worse than the expensive ones unless you are at the level where they are in constant/heavy use, hours of driving from the store, and you desperately need the extra durability, but the reliability of the batteries is where it’s actually worth the cash. Good batteries can hold a charge while not being used and last longer while in use. Cheap batteries can be e-waste after a week of use, or even before you open the box if they’re really bad.

As for ethical? The question is absurd. They’re your tools. It’s unethical for companies to even sell tools with proprietary connectors because it effectively acts as them telling you what you are allowed to do with your tools. There is no ethical problem in bypassing corporate B.S.

The fact that someone even asks this question tells me there is something deeply wrong with you he culture these days. No shade on you OP, I’m sure you are a good person. But it’s obvious that corporate propaganda has worked extremely well.

No, absolutely not, you are well within your rights to buy off brand and second hand equipment. Heck, I consider it a moral victory in avoiding the hellish markups the big brands put on their consumables.

Push back when kind of question comes up, we have to counter the propaganda, otherwise it will soon become law. I’m certain home tool manufacturers would move to a printer ink model in a heartbeat. It’s bad enough that there isn’t a universal battery mount as it is.

No, but corporations that sell overpriced products absolutely love that you’re asking this question.

No, more like the other way around

It’s unethical that companies constantly produce incompatible chargers and batteries that cause more pollution when lost, cut customer options, which after a few years when they no longer get made, cause even more pollution

LOL no.

You are in no way morally obligated to go out of your way to protect some corporation’s exploitative business model.

The fuck? Of course not.

Corporations aren’t people. You can’t harm them.

And even if they were, you wouldn’t owe them loyalty.

That’s called the other side of the coin of the free market economy. Capitalism.

You sell your tool’s battery for $200/ah? Someone makes the same thing without the tag that is compatible with the same ah rating but without your warranty for $50 and I buy it from them, you lower your price or see your sales drop off a cliff

What you think anyone should actually subscribe to the Ethics for thee but not for me model?

BTW I’ll be buying some aftermarket tabless 12ah batteries for my Ego tools when they kick and guess what I won’t be paying for 6 of them… $4,000

Yes, four. thousand. dollars.

I’ll be spending less than $1,000.

Why would that be unethical? I honestly don’t even understand this question, of course it wouldn’t be.

Intellectual property isn’t real.

Absolutely not, crazy position to hold. Fyi you can buy orprint 3D adapters for a lot of things. My dyson runs on dewalt batteries.

Corporations are not your friend. Ethics plays no part in it. It’s economics. If they price themselves out of the competition, that’s their problem, not yours.

Absolutely not. What’s actually unethical is the ruinous prices the name brands charge for their “genuine” batteries which under the hood are just as much Chinese garbage as the off-brand ones.

It’s more of a fire hazard than an ethical issue.

It is possible that DeWalt designs and manufactures its own batteries, and there is some clever tech in them that makes them superior to other batteries, or that they pay for high quality components that make them last longer.

However, it is just as likely that they buy the batteries themselves “off the shelf”, put them in a custom plastic enclosure, slap their label on them, and sell them for an insane markup. Sometimes, they don’t even need the custom enclosure and they just buy someone else’s finished battery product. The “off-brand” option may be the exact same product.

It’s not unethical to use off-brand batteries, but then if you buy a substandard one that causes a problem the manufacturer may use that as an excuse to deny their warranty claim. But when was the last time you replaced a tool under warranty?