makes you nostalgic for the days when you just plugged your damn controller in the system

Yeah, the remotes work for the 5 or so seconds they are on.  The guy at support wasn't really any help to me either.  Kinda frustrated!

This.  x100000.

At the very least, have them plug into the system to recharge.  Controllers that run off batteries is such a terrible idea on so many levels.

which is one of the things i think PS3 has over the other two, just plug the damn controller in and it synches right up. Hopefully Wii U will be like that.

I'm not joking? Joking is the point of the post silly goose!

lol calm down, it's not like I'm the only one who's posted non-advice

That is why it is crucial to have rechargeable batteries for the Wiimotes.  You can save a lot of money over the years after the initial cost of buying a charger and more expensive rechargeable batteries. 

Anyways, I did a few Google searches and didn't find anything new that could help you.  I would take the remotes and try them on a different system (if you have any friends that own a Wii).   However, since they turn off pretty quick it might be tricky trying to sync them to another system.  If you can get them to work on a different system then perhaps your Wii is having problems. If the controllers don't work on another system then it would be the controllers. I ran into syncing problems awhile back but I was able to resolve them.  Basically, if your controllers can't even work with another system then somehow both controllers might have went bad.  I'd just sit down by the system and try and sync the shit out of them. 

Here is a forum that deals with a similar problem. 

However, I doubt you will find anything too useful from that... although the last two posts were classic.

2nd to last post

"I FIXED IT!! I can't believe ot. All I did was Falcon Slap it and it started working again. I guess violence CAN solve problems..."

http://www.avsforum.com/t/775005/wii-remote-keeps-disconnecting

Maybe you should just throw one at the wall and see what happens?

You save even more money, but not needing bateries in the first place. ;)

Since it's both wiimotes I suspect the issue is with the Wii software itself. You could reboot it (in the Wii system menu) but that would clear all save gave data, Miis, etc. But if all else fails worth a try.

You could also try borrowing a wiimote from someone else. If it happens to it (after syncing) then for sure it's the Wii not the Wiimotes.

If you have any other Wiimotes or know anyone who you can easily borrow some from, do that first. See if those other Wiimotes can connect to your device. If they can, something is wrong with your Wiimotes. If they can't, something's wrong with your Wii.

That should help you figure out what the issue is.

I believe the issue is with the Wii itself. One way to be absolutely sure is to sync the wiimotes with a different Wii. If that goes well, you know its a console issue and just call Nintendo.