Saturday, June 4, 2011

New Cordless Drill

I recently bought a new cordless drill for my shop. It's a Makita BDF452. It's has an 1.5 ah, 18 volt, lithium ion battery. The kit I bought came with a Makita BDT142 Impact driver. It has 1,280 in/lbs of torque at 3,200 impacts a minute. I haven't used these a great deal, but I have used them enough to say that I am very pleased with these tools. They are extremely lightweight, yet have more than enough power. The 18 volt batteries work very well, and charge in an unbelievable 15 minutes! Lithium Ion is definitely the way to go! Needless to say, you won't run out of juice before the other battery is charged. Here are a couple pics with explanations.

Here's a pic of the whole package. It came with two batteries a quick charger with built in cooling fan, a durable carrying case. And of course, the two drills. I also received a mail in rebate offer for a free larger 3.0 ah battery.

This the 18 volt drill. It has a 1/2 chuck, LED worklight, two speed, all metal transmission, 450 in/lbs of torque, a belt clip, and 17 torque settings. To top it off, it only weighs 3.5 lbs and is only 8 in. long!

This bad boy is pretty sweet. When I first bought this set I thought what use would I have for this? Well, I found out. It works beautifully for driving screws, lag bolts, drilling, and loosening stuck bolts. It drives the screw like super fast and if the torque reaches a certain point it uses it's impact setting to easily drive it the rest of the way. Now, don't get this confused with an impact WRENCH. An impact wrench is mainly used for much beefier tasks like heavy duty automotive work or metal construction jobs. This driver also has a quick release chuck, led worklight, belt clip, and a glow in the dark rubber ring near the chuck (something I didn't notice until the other day).

I hope to use these tools for many more years (they come with a 3 year warranty) and don't expect them to fail any time soon. (I saw a video on you tube that showed the impact driver completely cracked in half and it still worked!)