Reccomend a .. Battery Drill

[davidimurray]

Right - with lashings of black paint all over the chassis it is going to be time to start panelling and fixing things on for real soon :D

My £9.99 tesco electric drill is starting to get loose bearings after two years of real hard abuse (inc probably over 100 hours of wire brushing) so I'm thinking it's about time to get a new drill. With all the drilling on the chassis coming up I'm thinking a battery drill might be a good idea - but which one. Ideally I want 2 batteries and don't want to break the bank.

Any reccomendations??

[spud69]

I have had AEG drills for a while now and have been very good with good after sales service. I am sure they still have a 3 year warranty with lifetime on battery and you get 2. New colours look a bit naff though.

AndyH

[Bonzo]

This it what I replaced my Bosch cordless drill with :)

B&Q Power Pro cordless drill (http://www.diy.com/diy/jsp/bq/nav.jsp?action=detail&fh_secondid=10487531&fh_view_size=10&fh_start_index=10&fh_location=%2f%2fcatalog01%2fen_GB&fh_search=cordless+drill&fh_eds=%c3%9f&fh_refview=search&ts=1275396516633&isSearch=true#BVRRWidgetID)

A fair bit more oomph than my last 14V one

I guess it'll never be the same quality as a Makita or the likes but is a good budget choice.
Best of all, if you kill it B&Q are good when it comes to exchanges or re-funds ;)

All in all decent battery life if you don't try drilling Quartz or 13mm holes in mild steel all day :eek: :D

[Headshot]

Screwfix were doing makita combi drills for £80 :eek:

I use Makita professionally and can't fault them :D

They do 12v 14.4v and 18v options, I have a 14.4 and an 18, I also use a 14.4 impact driver, with a socket adaptor its great at removing slightly rusted nuts and bolts ;)

[Davey]

I have two 18v Ryobi drills, came as a kit with two batteries and charger in a nice carry bag (that now does service as a peg bag for my awning on the motorhome). The two drills are a standard drill/driver and a right angled drill. From memory the whole kit was about £130 which is pretty good value as the right angled drill alone is about £100 from other manufacturers. Quality is as good as any other make I've used including Makita, Bosch and DeWalt. I also have a B&Q Pro Power 18v drill driver which is a superb piece of kit and very heavy duty, it has survived being dropped 12 feet onto concrete several times and still works well but it is a heavy piece of kit. Don't bother with cheapy brands as they're just not up to the job, I tried a cheapy B&Q jobbie before I got the Pro Power unit and first time I tried to drill into soft concrete blocks with the hammer action the gearbox disintegrated.

D.

[tkpm]

I have had a similar problems with the the B&Q Pro Power stuff i'm now using these,

http://www.screwfix.com/prods/84942/Power-Tools/Cordless-Drills/Erbauer-ERE196COM-18V-Combi-Drill-Standard-Duty

Been using them daily for the last two years without any problems.

Terry

[alga]

I have a set of Makitas, a drill/screwdriver and an impact driver. Two really small and light tools with tiny lightweight Lithium batteries. But it's amazing how much grunt they have and how long the battery lives. It's these two in a box plus a battery charger:

http://www.makita.eu/katalog/showitem.php?ItemID=DF030DWE
http://www.makita.eu/katalog/showitem.php?ItemID=TD090DWE

Since there's two of them there's a spare battery at hand.

The impact driver is great for doing wheel lug nuts, winds them up to about 30 Nm and only about a half turn remains to torque them up to 100 Nm.

Cost me about 150 quid for the set. I had them for 1.5 years, no regrets.

[MightyMouth]

If you want something that lasts and that you can get batteries for next year and the year after then either Makita or DeWalt are the way to go.

[Davey]

IMHO DeWalt are like Snap on, good quality kit but vastly overpriced. I've used Makita, Bosch, DeWalt, Ryobi, B&D, B&Q Power Pro and even a woolworths job in the past and most of the better named stuff is of similar quality. My B&Q Pro Power drill's battery started to fail after three anda half years so I phoned the helpline No (written on the side of the drill) and asked how much for a new battery? "No problem sir we'll send you one right away" Me: but how much is it? Them: "no cost sir" and true to their word two days later I received a brand new battery for it completely free of cost (nearly said charge there:p ).

D.

[AshG]

i had 14v a green bosch combi and after 3-4 years of daily abuse i couldnt kill it. it was the 1hr30min carge time that annoyed me in the end. finally gave it to my dad and got a blue professional 18v LiOn bosch. it come with 3 batterys a 30min charger and hard carry case. its great as i can charge two batterys before i even run one out which is really important for me when im on a rampage.

[davidimurray]

Thanks for all the advice guys - lots for me to think about!

What are peoples thoughts on buying secondhand kit? My current leaning is towards one of the B&Q Power Pro units or maybe I have seen secondhand Makita 18v drills on ebay for around £60. Is it worth risking a secondhand unit - do the batteries become tired?

I intend to use the drill just for the build - so mainly drilling rivet holes etc.

Cheers

Dave

[AshG]

what ever you get make sure it has got bags of torque and a good gearbox as drilling metal is a lot harder on the drill than wood work etc.

[Headshot]

Standard Ni-Mh Makita batteries do get tired, I kill them within 2 years. I always upgrade with 3Ah as opposed to the standard 1.5Ah batteries.

If you go for Lithium Ion batteries, they are much better technology,

They don't suffer from "battery memory" which is when they start to get a shorter life from never being fully discharged (they start to only charge the % of use that gets discharged)
But you pay A LOT more for Li-Ion battery gear.

I never buy second hand as Screwfix tend to do cheap deals every now and then (18v makita £80 :eek: offer finished now though :mad: )

Drills I have killed include, home base, black & decker, B&Q, Milwawke(sp?) and a few Hitachi sds type :(