My twenty year old 12v DeWalt cordless drill/driver is broken. It’s wasn’t completely broken until I tried to fix it but it’s definitely broken now.
This wouldn’t be for use with the lowrider. This is around the house drill/driver. Thinking 1/2 chuck. I have a big corded Dewalt hammer drill. I need some thing to carry around with me.
What do people use? Harbor Freight tools bad? I would love to stay well under 100 dollars. I also dream of getting 2 batteries with it. There was some at Walmart and Menards that looked usable.
I spent an hour or so googling and I decided since I have go back to work for 5 hours for the Monthly Release I would see what people have to say. Thanks in advance.
-adam
Don’t discard it, take the drill apart, the chuck is still good and always useful to have an extra. The motor, probably a 775 or 875 style is a nice extra DC motor.
I just recently went through the same with my 15 year old Dewalt 18v drill. I opted for a set from Milwaukee that came with a hammer drill, impact driver, two batteries, and a charger. I think I paid $299. If its longevity your looking for, stay away from Harbor Freight.
Well since the current one lasted 20 years the 20v dewalt is on sale at Home Depot with 2 batteries for $99 which is under 100 before tax. I think they still make the 12v line as well.
I have the 20v max collection of tools and enjoy them though I wish the drill was a bit lighter.
The value is in the interchangeable batteries so pick the line you like best and stick with it. Dewalt is nice because they keep their tool lines forever.
I’ll second the harbor freight caution. I have some of their cheap stuff and the batteries just don’t get the job done. I went to pick up another battery, and it was kind 5 or 8 bucks more for the entire drill and extra charger, lol, so I bought 3. Now I have plenty of batteries to rotate and extra drills😂
But I don’t recommend it.
I buy HF tools if the tool falls into the “use only once a year category”. Although I have Milwaukee and Porter Cable Drill / Driver combos, this caught my eye at lowes…
Thank you for the advice. I would like to find a way to stay with. The Ryobi price was attractive as well. It just seems looking at pictures that there are three to five general designs and I wondered if they were all really just the same thing. I saw the same shopvac at three different stores branded three different ways for three different prices.
Yeah it’s no coincidence they look the same many are made by the same company…
For example the craftsman above, the porter cable, the black and decker and the dewalt are all made by sbd. The enclosures may even be the same on a few just in diff colors. The innards and quality do vary though between the lines so you need to be careful.
And of course they tweak the battery connectors just enough to make them incompatible although there are adapters.
4 years back or so I grabbed a ryobi cordless pack, I was not very happy with it and the saw leaked all it’s lube within a few hours use. Honestly, at the time I thought all cordless was gunna kinda suck. HD took it back. I grabbed a similar priced (cheap) Porter cable set from Lowes. It has been an absolute workhorse set. Sadly it isnot carried by Lowe’s anymore, but that might have some sort of indication of this manufacturers stuff. This is what I got, I even got the smaller batteries to keep things light, good choice, Amazon.com.
Just yesterday a friend was here and shocked by how my 7" cordless saw was just ripping through a pallet.
I took my son with me to Home Depot and looked at all the sales and deals. I ended up with a $100 Rigid R86001 1/2", 18V. The Dewalt inventory shelves were empty or I would have bought one of those. I have charged it and squeezed the trigger and it feels so much more powerful than the one that died. I have two conference calls going on for our software implementation. People are upset so it’s not the right time for me to work with power tools and miss something. I had a Ryobi in my hand and my son, whom is 16 and lacks any interest in science, labor, tools or computers decided the Rigid was a better choice. It felt fine in my hand and I expect a Rigid tool to last longer than Ryobi, so I now own a Rigid cordless drill. I would have said they were too expensive, but I stayed at $100.
Thanks again for the responses. I look forward to putting my dust system together and trying yet again to cut something with the lowrided. I’m back to cutting lines and circles and measuring because I can’t seem to get things to be the size I swear I am aiming at.
Though my hobby-related activities have now slowed to near-zero, I am totally satisfied with the Bosch 12V cordless drill and impact driver I bought from Lowes after my move back to East Texas. I’ve had PorterCable, Dewalt, and Craftsman over the years but I was looking for something adequate for home-duty use and yet lighter in weight because I’m rapidly losing strength in my hand and wrists. They are not cheap but are smooth and surprisingly powerful… and driving long screws with the impact driver is sheer delight.
I work in construction so have gone through my fair share of drivers… teal, red, yellow… lots of brands vintages and models. One I will say avoid are the Milwaukee small drivers. They have poor low throttle control and I find myself getting frustrated with that often (like every 5 screws the motor stalls). The cheaper homeowner variety will have the same issues (Ryobi, hf, etc). My favorite and daily driver are my Makita LXT brushless drill/drivers with 5.0Ah packs. Those are bulletproof and a joy to work with. Setting counter sinks they have IMHO the best control available. In fact I still use my 15yo driver all the time (this has included many times where it was used to zip in self drilling screws in thick steel for 8hr shifts… won’t overheat on you). Yellow are decent too, but a bit heavier in the hand at the end of a long day, and a tad less finess with countersink vs makita. Before buying any drill, I suggest picking one up and driving some long screws with it (not just one screw… like 20 to give it a chance to f up if it is going to)… see how they feel because tools with annoying habits are no fun to live with.
I won’t get into battery ecosystems, since you are just asking about a driver not tools for construction. However if you are planning to add tools to the batteries, this is something you absolutely have to think about. At the end of the day you will be married to the batteries, not necessarily the tools. So don’t make a bad choice there.this is where the spendy brands are better.
I personally use my tools way too often to get hf or Ryobi. The homeowner brands end up costing you more long term if you are like me.
I’ve got all Ryobi One+ here. My old yellow batteries have pretty much all given up the ghost, but they are something like 10+ years old. They make a huge assortment of tools that fit the same battery… HD has a special going right now where if you buy a two pack of batteries for about half the normal price, you get a tool with them. They have that special a couple of times each year…
I realized the op already has his new Rigid driver… all good for home use imho. My tldr was basically stating that if you plan on going through… oh… say less than a couple/few boxes of 50 screws a year (avergage over a few years) then a typical lightweight homeowner lithium kit will probably do fine for a long time (Ryobi 1+, and the big brand compacts… still prefer of the makita impacts though).
Otoh, if the drill will commonly have to go through a box of 50 in an hour, then a homeowner driver probably will let you down. I can say I have ended the life of more than a few hf brand tools in less than a day of work. They do have some humdingers at hf (mostly grinders though) but for the most part you get what you pay for. Ryobi can almost handle lighter pro level work, but the burning sensation in your hand (hot motor and batteries) does not inspire confidence to get a job done early.
I have the makita LXT stuff. I have the blue ones but I really like the black ones that are smaller. I leave the blue in the garage and use the black ones in the house. I can’t remember how I ended up with both, but I think the blue ones came basically for free when I bough one of the other tools and a battery at some holiday sale.
I know OP already made a good choice, but I am just adding in my $0.02.
Thanks for the conversation. I had to think about OP for a couple minutes, as I do not normally contribute to the internet.
It seems like these tools are not the same situation as sump pumps. I have purchased two sump pumps from Box Stores. I don’t recall my parents changing theirs in 40 years. I will have to go to a plumbing supply if I need another one because the quality from those big retail stored is crap.
As I read this thread it seems like there is much less difference in home use tools than between the Craftsmen sockets and the Snap-on sockets I have.
They sell Rigid and Ryobi stuff as refurbs and new, usually at pretty steep discounts. I bought a Ryobi One + brushless drill/driver with charger and two batteries for $69 about a year ago to replace my old 12V DeWalt driver that used NiMH battery (which cost about $90 to replace).
I have since bought a One+ stapler and high pressure inflator for topping up my bike tires. All great tools, and they all use the same batteries.
