Promising way to retain mobility on old machines

[unlawfulsoup]

I have a decent collection of vintage machines that I enjoy using, especially my favorite of all time the Thinkpad 770. Right now I have a few viable batteries, but they are rare to come by. As most of you know, rebuilding is not for the faint of heart and it is a tedious, potentially dangerous process. This got me to thinking when someone built me a USB-C to Powerbook 5xx power adapter, that there was no real reason these machines couldn't run off a powerbank with the right characteristics. A large number of vintage thinkpads either run on 20v (rectangular prong) or 16v barrel adapter. Modern powerbanks can easily output 20v cleanly and at that point you just need a cable. Adafruit conveniently sells various USB-C to barrel adapter cables chipped to specific voltages, notably 15v and 20v. The 15v will work fine for a 16v machine, I found this out with the Powerbook and it held true with Thinkpads as well.

Thus my experiment was put into practice on my IBM Thinkpads. With a 15v to usb-C running through a 20000mAh powerbank (20v PD) a 770, 570 ran with no issues. I have been using my work 770 for a week this way with absolutely no issues. I then shifted to the 20v machines where I used a rectangular tip that came with an adapter set paired with said barrel adapter. Testing with a 760 and 755 I had equally good results, machine worked with no issues.







So if you want a fairly inexpensive way to use your thinkpads on USB-C power or mobile like they were intended this is a solid solution in my opinion. I can link the components used, but I am not sure on forum rules regarding that. Anyone maybe you will see me out and about working on a vintage Think.

[panips]

I just use some USB-C PD trigger modules to get the 15v and 20v, they are tiny and can be easily built into some 3D printed connector/converter.

[panips]

I uploaded the 3d model files to build your PD/USB-C to DC adapters for ThinkPad 355/360/370/530/750/755/760 (and maybe more). 2 different versions were zipped. Both were tested on a very old Ender 3D printer.

hxxps://archive[dot]org/download/thinkpad_202508/ThinkPad.zip

You may keep this adapter plugged so you can use your vintage laptop anywhere with a PD usb-c power bank or chargers. And this is how it looks like:



To build your own, you need some jumper (dupont) wires, the PD trigger modules, and plastic bonder. For PD trigger modules, you can find a lot of kinds with different sizes but the smallest one might look like:


leave all the jumpers open and it would provide 20V which fits perfectly for the ThinkPad.

and then, prepare your jumper wires


It's as easy as inserting, securing, and soldering...




and, if you like, you may use some plastic bonder to seal and glue 2 pieces, and then wait for 24 hours before you can use it.

[unlawfulsoup]

I just use some USB-C PD trigger modules to get the 15v and 20v, they are tiny and can be easily built into some 3D printed connector/converter.

Yeah, those can work. A locked voltage cable is like $10-15 so it isn't exactly a huge investment.

I uploaded the 3d model files to build your PD/USB-C to DC adapters for ThinkPad 355/360/370/530/750/755/760 (and maybe more). 2 different versions were zipped. Both were tested on a very old Ender 3D printer.
etc. etc.

Very nice work.