I was very skeptical about battery powered power tools but I am coming around.
When we bought the house, I bought some corded yard tools (weed whacker and leaf blower) because I was assuming battery ones are weak and unreliable but the reality is that operating these things while wired in is just a huge pain in the ass. Meanwhile my neighbors who have battery powered equivalents are doing just fine. My mower (which came with the house) is battery powered and works great.
The Ryobi drill I bought when I moved in here almost 3 years ago has been working great and I literally had to charge it only once in this time (I guess I don't use it often but the fact that a power tool maintained charge for 1.5 years is impressive in itself.)
I guess I also took a bet on the battery world when I bought a hybrid. Likewise going strong going into the 3rd year.
Maybe it's time to stop thinking of batteries as weak and unreliable. But they are definitively an additional point of failure and complexity.
One HUGE difference is that the "crappy walmart tools" (replace with equivalent store brand like Ryobi, Craftsman, etc) are actually quite decent.
Ten+ years ago I would be quite adamant about people getting "professional" brands, now unless you really need to "buy into the red army" anything is basically fine.
It's true of quite a few products now that I think of it. There used to be "good TVs and really shit TVs" - now even the bargain crap is pretty good.
Ryobi most definitely is a big box brand targeted to consumers. These are cheap tools and I challenge you to find a contactor or tradesman that uses them commercially.
Regardless of the manufacturer, battery technology has increased so incredibly that even the "crappiest" cordless tools are better than those from the early 2000s.
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Src: retired electrician that has used (and broken) a lot of tools
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My primary tool of choice is Stanley's upscale brand, DeWalt.
Were I considering to "buy a cheaper tool," perhaps esoteric items intended for single use: instead of Ryobi, I'd settle on Harbor Freight.
Where I spent most of my wiring days [IBEW], the "top tool" was always a competition of Yellow -vs- Red.
One of the reasons I was leaning toward DeWalt is they seem to have a shared battery system. I don't want to have 20 different battery standards when I could just keep buying the same ones and using them all on different tools.
I have several different electric drills I received as gifts with their own batteries.
Here's my "pro tip" for purchasing less-expensive 20V DeWalt batteries, although it only works at the end of autumn: around the first annual winter freeze, all the outdoor tools go on sale.
Typically outdoor tools are paired with their largest AH battery available; sometimes the pair retail for less than just a single 4AH+ battery [sometimes "half off"].
Doesn't always work out, but I do this every other year (and have multiple weed whackers lol). My last 4AH 20V Dewalt battery cost me $49 this way.
Most manufacturers share batteries of the same voltage but even DeWalt and Milwaukee have been bending that rule (there are flex volt Dewalts, and High Output M18s that have different characteristics).
Man I still have some pro cordless electric screwdriver that was pretty good 20-25y ago, we used those on construction sites. You can actually still get replacement batteries (off brand) but for around 70 bucks last I checked I'm really not sure if I wanna risk that :P
Then again I've never bought one for myself and still kept this one from my dad.
The tool brand stuff gets highly confusing very quickly. In the USA Ryobi is a brand manufactured for Home Depot by TTI (the same company that owns Milwaukee but it is NOT Milwaukee manufacturing for Ryobi).
Outside of the USA it's completely different. Sometimes the same brand can be nearly identical even though manufactured differently, other times they have the same name and are completely different.
Another one is Rigid - their power tools are manufactured by TTI, except for the plumbing-specific ones (sometimes) which are made by Emerson.
It's quite like hard drives are (were?) where there's only a few manufacturers but many more brands.
Also have some Ryobi stuff. Got a surprisingly affordable (under $150) package deal with a drill, impact driver, oscillating tool, reciprocating saw, flashlight, and small circular saw. Came with a charger and two battery packs.
None of these are incredible tools, but none of them have failed on me. The only thing that's died is one of the battery packs and I replaced it with a larger one since the included ones were pretty small. Pretty sure I killed it by using it with a more demanding tool not included in the package.
In retrospect, I'm thinking the cheapo deal was a way to get people like me - just bought a fixer upper house and looking to do some light-to-moderate DIY work - invested in their ecosystem. Well, it's worked. When I need other cordless tools, I get more Ryobi since they work with the same battery packs. Grinder, hand vacuum, etc. have been the same brand.
That said, I've needed higher quality tools as well, and when I got a better circular saw and a big hammer drill, I went corded and had the benefit of not worrying about battery brands. Probably should've gone corded for the grinder as well (it kills battery packs quickly).
The nature of the tool makes the corded/not corded decision easier too. The ones I mentioned (weed whacker, leaf blower, drill) are usually used when you're moving around and having to plug in and drag the chord around is a real pain in the ass.
For something like circular saw, I think that's much less of an issue. I picture that as something you set up in a spot and use for the duration of the project. So I guess I am surprised it even comes in a battery option.
The battery powered circ saw is nice because it's lightweight and easy to use for quick cuts. I've even taken it with me to rough cut stuff in the parking lot of a store so it will fit in my car.
Didn't need anything better until a few years later and bought a big beefy Milwaukee. I still use the battery powered Ryobi for 80% of stuff though, just due to convenience.
That said, I see things like battery powered table saws and have zero desire to mess with any of that.
The only real use case I can think of for battery powered table saws is for hobbyists/homeowners who do their work in the yard, or maybe in an unpowered tool shed. A lot of older homes have no outdoor power outlets.
For "pro" use on a job site, it's hard to imagine a battery powered table saw having enough power or endurance. I know my plug-in table saw seems to use at least ~1,200 watts @ 120v when cutting something tough like pressure-treated lumber, because it trips the surge protector.
But, I don't know. I see Dewalt has like a 60V powered table saw. With a big enough battery maybe it's enough to be useful for pros.
A 15A 120V wall outlet (not uncommon in the USA) can provide at most 1800W (a bit less in practice to give some headroom to avoid tripping excessively sensitive breakers). The motor wastes about half that, so you expect about 900W power output if hooking a tool up to a dynamometer. DeWalt's 60V cordless circular saw can put out over 1500W into a dynamometer[1], with similar waste (up to about 3600W max from the battery). The batteries get discharged at about 50-60A max according to the DeWalt specs I could find, which makes sense given the measured power output. Modern cordless batteries are better for actual power output than (15A) corded tools, comparable to 25A corded tools!
They're worse for run-time, of course, batteries get drained. Endurance is the issue, but battery powered tools can beat corded tools for power these days.
> So I guess I am surprised it even comes in a battery option.
If you're going to a job site with limited electricity and don't know the exact cut of wood you need before arriving, I can see value. This option isn't for medium/large workloads, and isn't for the guy operating a wood working shop, but might be for a guy that does small jobs away from a shop.
Cordless tools tend to be more convenient. While a corded tool might technically be more powerful, for a quick cut it's annoying to unravel the cord, possibly grab an extension cord and unravel that, make the cut, then wind up the cables again. Vs. grab a cordless tool and maybe throw a battery in.
Cable management can also be annoying sometimes when moving around.
> I picture that as something you set up in a spot and use for the duration of the project. So I guess I am surprised it even comes in a battery option
I believe you are confusing a handheld circular saw with a miter saw. A miter saw has a base, an arm, and a blade guard; and must be placed on a flat surface/table to use it.
(some of the table saws from other brands are "duel fuel" and can take a battery or a plug, can be nice).
Battery power table saws seem a bit silly until you realize that the construction people often arrive before there's any site power at all, after all, someone has to build the site power connections.
Yeah, I am pretty sure the "starter pack" was a deal they had going at the Depot. I typically avoid big packs of things (pots and pans, knives, etc) since I end up using just a subset and would rather get higher quality versions of those.
But this was a straightforward way to get a bunch of reasonable quality tools cheaply and I've honestly used all of them without any failures, so it's worked out.
Those starter packs have also gotten better, they used to be something like one brushless tool and a bunch of cheaper brushed tools - now they're often all brushless.
For many years I had a Black and Decker hand-sized screwdriver (single speed, hex bits only) that I used for almost 20 years. It still runs. About 1.5 years ago I upgraded to a Bosch drill, with variable speed, a real chuck and even a torque dial. With all those features it was still tiny and light compared to my corded DeWalt (the "real" drill). I charged up the 2 batteries. Used the drill for all the little projects and finally, two weeks ago, the first battery ran out. Put in the other, which has held its charge just fine, and back to work.
I'm a big fan of my Bosch 12 volt tools. I like the small size and the power works for almost everything I do. As a DIYer, I rarely need to charge my tools as I don't use them that often.
operating these things while wired in is just a huge
pain in the ass. Meanwhile my neighbors who have battery
powered equivalents are doing just fine. My mower (which
came with the house) is battery powered and works great.
Yeah, sometimes "worse is better." I went from a gas-powered leaf blower to a 40V Ryobi leaf blower and I use it probably 25X as often because of the convenience. It's quiet enough to use late at night for cleanup in the garage without worrying about waking the neighbors (also I won't die from using a gas-powered device in an enclosed space...)
The 40V leaf blower is obviously less powerful, but it's powerful enough and has more than enough power and runtime to clean up a 1/4 acre suburban yard or maybe even twice that.
But [batteries] are definitively an additional
point of failure and complexity.
Well, theoretically yes! But in practice it certainly seems the answer is no, they're not really a failure point. This is the height of unscientific anecdota, obviously, but on forums and comment sections and such I just don't see people having battery issues with these major brands.
I think Li-Ion batteries are pretty mature technology at this point. There's a little bit of complexity in the battery itself because it keeps track of its charge level. Then the tools themselves seem to be pretty much braindead simple w.r.t battery technology. They are simply expecting some DC input from the battery. And the battery shuts itself off when the level is too low.
Worst comes to worst, a battery fails, you get a new one for a fairly reasonable cost. Once you buy into a tool system you will probably have at least two batteries so you're not dead in the water in the meantime.
The batteries do die (usually because of letting them sit too long or running them too hard or discharging them too much) but they're reliable enough and it's just a simple swap when it finally does die.
I've never bought a battery, I either get new ones with a kit I want, or I can buy a tool and get a battery free, etc.
> Similar is happening in the cordless power tool industry. There’s Dewalt and Milwaukee – in no particular order – and then everyone else.
this seems to be a very US-centric analysis? if I were to look at Europe I'd say that on the pro market there's Hilti and then everyone else. and the consumer market is very open (Bosch, Ryobi, Makita, Dewalt etc)
EDIT: and of course, Parkside, aka the greatest value for money of all time
I'm in the US and have used Makita for almost 20 years and been totally satisfied. You wouldn't know they were a distant third place or worse based on availability, breadth of offerings, price, or quality. My concerns are quality and durability, unlike the author who seems more interested in subjective things like 'unwavering commitment to end users' - I don't even know what that really means. Same for his others apparent beefs.
Makita are very popular over here in Germany. But their "global" website (https://www.makita.biz) doesn't quite scream "commitment to end users". (C) 2006?! Their German site looks a bit more modern...
He goes into details in other posts - Makita is just fine as a tool, but new tools take forever to appear in the USA (if ever) and what they have hasn't changed much over the years, whereas other manufacturers are releasing improved tools pretty regularly.
No, everything is fake. Its mostly wood, paint and fabrics, some metal but its often painted aluminum. Planer, drill/screwdriver, sander, jigsaw and staplers (pneumatic staplers/nail gun, as sibling said), are the main tools. You also want to limit dust, and i think that's one of the two main reason why Festool is chosen over other professional woodworking equipment when filming on location, their vacuum cleaner is probably the best (or they were the first to interface it so well with their tools). the second reason is that those tools are easy to store and transport, and their modularity helps too.
You can sometime also see overlockers and sewing machines on bigger productions, but those are either paid by the productor, or depends on the worker prefered tools, and you will see a lot of diversity (my father's overlocker brand closed shop in the 90s with the rest french textile industry).
Hilti does not have many tools for lumber construction, specializing in commercial steel and concrete technology. Festool has more woodworking tools though, I'd imagine you use a nail gun/stapler the most when building a movie set and neither firm makes these.
Apparently there's blue and green Bosch tools and one is the pro line, as I only recently learned.
Not sure if Würth is still around for tools, but we had Hilti and Würth for the most part. But I also inherited an old Oerlikon drill that is probably older than I am...
Your analysis seems like a very Europe-centric analysis. Can you please add your opinions on the best tools for sale in Japan? And then Australia next.
This may surprise you, but some people are from regions of the world where only a subset of worldwide products are available to them. Those people will then only write about the things generally available in their country.
> Similar is happening in the cordless power tool industry
the cordless power tool industry is a global industry, the author even lists german and japanese countries in their "analysis". therefore it doesn't seem amiss to expect a global analysis before saying something like "the industry is moving this way"
Is it? Every corded power tool I buy comes with a standard power plug (region dependent of course). Plug it in, and it works. Buy another tool from a different brand (perhaps they are better at that type of tool), and now you have two tools which just work.
If you go all in on cordless, now battery management becomes an issue. There is no universal battery solution, so you either have to commit to a single brand, or deal with several charging stations and battery types. If one of these tools manages to survive for a decade or two, you now have to deal with old batteries with may or may not hold a charge for a decent while, and get into the hell that is after-market batteries. The corded tool meanwhile, will just work.
I have a cordless handheld drill, and a cordless impact driver. Those are two of the tools you really want to have cordless. I got them from the same brand with four batteries and two charging stations. The rest is all corded. Extension cords are cheap.
Just my personal experience. Had corded tools for years and I think from a power perspective they have battery beat. But I was gifted a cordless drill and impact driver and they last forever. Battery management hasn’t been an issue. I use them almost every weekend (hanging drywall for example, which involves a lot of screws) or in my pocket hole jig. I charge the batteries every few months over night.
This has been my experience as well. I resisted cordless for far longer than I could really justify, and have been very, very, very pleasantly surprised with how well the cordless stuff works.
I have all corded tools, but with all the hype and excitement around cordless, I thought I'd give cordless a try and got a 18V Bosch cordless drill. It chews through its battery in probably 2-3 hours of work, and so I ended up getting three batteries and two charging stations just to be able to sustain the damn thing through a day's worth of work. I'd expect much better.
Cordless battery powered is probably fine for light duty hobbyist work, but for constant use, it's annoying to have to keep juggling batteries among chargers.
And that's just one tool. I couldn't imagine having to juggle multiple incompatible batteries among multiple incompatible chargers. Good grief. I'll just keep my cords thank you.
It's for builders mainly. On a construction site you might not have a wall outlet near every place where you do work and running extension cords is dangerous both due to tripping and to the shock hazard when a cord gets damaged. Many crews used pneumatic tools, which eliminated shock hazard, but cordless is taking care of tripping too. They use multi-port fast chargers and whole bunch of batteries though.
Also in automotive, again, even though the workshop has the power (and they traditionally used pneumatic tools), running hoses everywhere is dangerous and annoying, I see a lot of mechanics using cordless impacts and grinders.
Interesting, I have a DeWalt 24v (I think) set. In the week I spent building a playhouse (soft wood) for my son, the drill and impact driver were in constant use for a week, and I'd charge every day or two. For my "normal" usage, it's weeks to months between charges. Seriously. The last time I charged a battery was September, and I use the drill for a few minutes every month, and it's still showing 3 out of 3 bars. That set, the set was very pricey!
Interesting, I have a DeWalt 24v (I think) set. In the week I spent building a playhouse for my son, the drill and impact driver were in constant use for a week, and I'd charge every day or two. For my "normal" usage, it's weeks to months between charges. Seriously. The last time I charged a battery was September, and I use the drill for a few minutes every month, and it's still showing 3 out of 3 bars. That set, the set was very pricey!
The title of the article is specific to -cordless- tools. Of course there are downsides around battery management and corded tools can have more torque but thats not what the article is about.
I think the point of the article is cordless is good and after some major advances away from nicad and brushed motors, things have pretty much plateaued.
The title specifically claims that we are in a golden age of cordless tools. Having to commit to a single manufacturer or submit to managing a herd of batteries of varying species is not my idea of a golden age just yet.
Team Yellow all the way, rhymes with default so you know it works.
But seriously find a brand that is generally good then you only have to worry about 1 type of charger and you can collect a small variety of batteries. I have 5 5amphr batteries that I use for everything, takes up minimal space. The only time I come to using them up is when I mow the lawn and deplete 2+.
Problem with the one brand wonder is that if you join the red army for M18, eventually you'll get an M12 for some reason, and suddenly you're on two battery systems without even noticing.
Big Yellow has the same thing, though those packs look even more similar. It can be useful to have different backs visually distinct.
Yeah, but still... I mean, a cordless screwdriver is nice, but e.g. a cordless drill only makes sense if you are regularly going to drill 10 holes in different places all around the house - otherwise the time spent plugging in your tool is negligible compared to the time you will spend drilling the holes. Not to mention you have to make sure your batteries are charged. So they make sense for professionals, but not for regular "DIY people" who only use a drill once every few months...
My cordless drill just is my cordless screwdriver; also my cordless IKEA assembler, etc. You just need one that has a clutch and a featherable trigger.
And even with one manufacturer: I have gardening tools 18V from Bosch and home tools with 18V from Bosch. Batteries don't fit each other. I was stunned.
"Golden Age" is a stretch for sure. More like "power parity with corded". That said, I upgraded a bunch of tools recently and went cordless for everything I could.
> Extension cords are cheap.
And cumbersome. I can't be the only one who's borked a cut with a circular saw because the extension cord got hung up on something. I want to focus on what's in front of the saw, not what's behind it.
In the past few years, I've gradually come to realize how much batteries (in anything) can actually cost me in things other than just upfront monetary price.
For example, even if a corded $THING costs as much as its cordless counterpart, with the cordless one, I have to think about things like:
- Charging schedule
- Whether the device is draining battery when I'm not using it
- How long before the battery needs replacing
- How much a replacement battery costs
- How to dispose of the battery when it needs replacing
- Whether I'm even able to replace the battery
- How well the device functions without a battery or with a dead/dying one
Without going down that particular rabbit hole, things like right to repair attempt to help with some of those things. However, the corded version avoids all of them categorically.
So it's not that I'll never buy a battery-powered $THING again. Just that I really try to consider all of those "hidden costs" before choosing instead of just rather-blindly going with the battery-powered version (like I did before). In other words, having a battery installed in a device really needs to provide a consistent and realistic value for my personal use case before I'd choose it over a corded version.
If we ever create a battery with effectively infinite recharge cycles, then my stance might change, but I'm not holding my breath on that ever happening. For several reasons.
If it moves with me (drill, impact wrench, etc) it should almost certainly be cordless. If it is stationary (table saw, vacuum, etc) it should almost certainly be corded. Some tools are both.
I've done well with a corded drill (we only use it occasionally in the house/garage near outlets). My 10yo cordless battery packs died and the new LiPo batteries (same vendor) have a different form factor.
Take a look at what the pros are using. Most of the tools they are using are going to be cordless these days.
As a DIYer, I have my cordless tools and rarely need to charge them. For the most part they go many months between charges as I don't use my tools very often. I do have multiple batteries so it isn't a problem for me when a battery dies, I just put it on the charger and grab another battery.
It depends on the tool. You can pry my corded Bosch drill hammer from my cold, dead hands.
When you need to drill holes in concrete with rebar, I don’t want to mess around with battery powered tools.
A point I haven’t seen brought up here is how much weight batteries add to the tool.
I can relatively easily drill an 18mm hole with my corded drill hammer using one hand all day long, good luck doing that with a battery powered drill hammer.
Oh yeah, the Boschhammer is one of my favourites. Given that it is the one tool where I would use those really long masonry drill bits in, I appreciate not being burdened by the extra weight. I'll accept the inconvenience of the power cord on a ladder for just that.
It is important to choose your battery system and stick with it. I selected Makita because that's what my contractor uses to make a living. I recently took advantage of my state's green lawn care rebate to purchase a heavily discounted Makita lawn mower which -crucially- came with 4 big batteries that fit all my other tools.
It is also important to realize that a pair of 18v Lithium Ion batteries can deliver more wattage than a regular (USA) household electrical outlet, especially while using an extension cord. The Makita chop saw is a great example of a battery product that is actually superior (IMHO) to the corded version.
Makita's fast chargers have a built-in fan that cools down a hot battery and maintains optimal temp during the charge cycle. Even my oldest batteries still work great.
This is true for contractors, where you have a bunch of batteries, some (human based) system to charge them and keep them charged, so when you need to do something, there's always a battery ready. I have a corded drill, and that thing always works... i need an extension cord, sure, but I plug it in and it works, 1 minute, 1 hour, 10 hours,... it just works. I have a battery powered angle grinder, and the battery is always empty. Need to cut something? Empty... take out the old electric one, do whatever I needed to cut, charge the battery ~half way (storage charge), put it away. Two years later, I need it again.. battery empty. Charge it, but since it went too low (overdischarge, undervoltage), the capacity is reduced now. Work, charge, work, charge, then back to the case for the next two years, and two more years when the battery is empty and practically dead with maybe 5 hours of actual use. In the meantime, I have a circular saw from 1980s that still works.
tldr: if you need power tools once per year or less, corded might be a better choice.
I would say that infrequently used tools are an especially good choice for battery-powered cordless tools when the alternative is typically a tool powered by a gas small engine. For example, I need a chainsaw for infrequent jobs, but every time I ran it, I'd have to fiddle with the carb and the spark plugs, throw out old gas, make a new gas/oil mix, etc., so it was a major pain and I'd use it only if I really, really needed it. I replaced it with a 36v Makita chainsaw and it's a breeze to use every time.
But I don't think it's about those kinds of tools. The type of power tools who truly benefit from having a combustion engine motor are not getting replaced by battery powered tools anytime soon because of energy density restriction.
If you could replace a gas-powered tool with a battery tool, either it would be way overkill or really old and inefficient.
In my opinion if the chainsaw you mentioned seems sufficient, it is probably not that necessary and you could get away with infrequent rental or even human powered tools.
Then again if you have the budget and don't mind spending it on things that deliver less value, why not but arguably if you were to spend that much on this type of tool you could get a much better gas powered chainsaw for the price...
Not who you're replying to, but I also have a brushless 36V Makita chainsaw. I buck and split 2-3 full cords of firewood every year for myself. The biggest logs I've cut with it are ~30 inches in diameter. I only have a 16" bar, so that means coming at it from all around. The Makita is stunningly good for my use case, much better than the gas saw I used to have.
I have two sets of batteries, and they'll get me through more cutting than I want to do in a day. Occasionally weather will cause me to need to do more than I want in a day, and one set of batteries will charge in just enough time for me to get through the other set and take a little break, so I can go all day long. In my case, the only time I'm not cutting near grid power is when I'm clearing a log that fell across a trail I'm riding in my UTV, but I'm not going to keep riding down a trail that has enough downed trees to consume a set of batteries.
There's no place to rent chainsaws within an hour's drive of where I live (I live in a rural, forested area). There are certainly more powerful gas-powered saws, but I don't need the power. If I suddenly feel like getting some cutting done, I much prefer not having to worry about whether I have gas and premix (I still have to worry about bar/chain oil, but a gallon lasts me 2-3 years). The nearest gas station is a 30-40 minute round trip. I love not having to worry about disturbing my wife or the neighbor when their windows are open. It was fun last summer when my neighbor came out of his house to be surprised that I'd bucked 3 logs, each 30 feet long and 18" in diameter, while he slept with his windows open. Saying there are "much better gas powered" saws implies a single dimension of comparison. That's not the case - there are just different trade-offs.
The battery tools are rapidly catching up; five years ago none of the tree maintenance crews I saw had anything but the gas; now they all have a Milwaukee or similar battery chainsaw in the truck. It's much quicker, lighter, and easier for all sorts of things that don't need the biggest gas saws.
And the price difference is dropping (the Milwaukee is about $500 including battery and charger, without sales) which is "close enough" to a quality saw, once you take into account the consumables.
That's the whole "golden age" - we are at or passing the point where the cordless tool is just better even accounting for all the various options.
I guess it's even more important that if you don't use it for work, you will probably like 90% use it at home, or your own property where you know you will have power (and an extension cord).
Not true for professionals doing work somewhere or spontaneously.
I chose Makita for the same reason and I've loved the stuff. The tools are solid and well thought-out, the batteries have lasted for years, and I've been able to get away with far fewer batteries than I have tools which saves a bunch of money.
I wonder if everyone but the top two is starting to regret the proprietary batteries. It would be a break from tradition, and potentially incompatible, but the other manufacturers could adopt a joint battery standard to try to attract users who aren’t willing to go all in on a single system.
The batteries are a selling point for Ryobi too, they’ve maintained compatibility with one 18v design since like 1990 so you don’t wonder “are they going to replace this battery design with an incompatible one next year?”
I think the companies that wouldn’t like the proprietary are ones trying to make a new entry into the market, since you have to convince someone your tool is worth adding a new battery/charger to the garage while knowing there’s not a full system of everything that could use it.
If there were a standard battery it’d be easier to say “we’re a company that only makes a circular saw.”
Yeah, I'm on the Ryobi system for exactly that reason, and still using some of my original blue tools from the 90s. They just refuse to quit, and with modern batteries they perform better than ever.
It's also the broadest system, with everything from drills and saws, to lights and fans, to soldering irons and dremel-like tools. Some of their stuff isn't as compact or as full-featured as Milwaukee, and this is shitty artificial segmentation on the part of their shared parent company, but for the most part it's all I've needed. (The new HP drill with the metal chuck and anti-backdriving clutch finally answers my chief complaint about all Ryobi drills before that.)
But, NOBODY, on any battery platform, or even all of them put together, makes EVERYTHING I want, and I end up doing a fair amount of hacking. Ryobi 18v is a forgiving system, with the BMS integrated into the batteries, so you can just draw power and do whatever. I made my own soldering iron long before Ryobi released their own. I've had USB outputs since long before Ryobi released their own. I've cobbled together a 100W USB-C one now, while the official ones top out at 45W. I've been using those batteries to drive an electric cooler/freezer since long before Ryobi released their own.
If I hypothetically had universal batteries that would fit any tool from any brand, would that make it better? Not significantly, I don't think. Other brands don't seem to offer significantly more, or significantly earlier. If I want a lot more or a lot earlier, I have to do it myself.
A universal battery would've given me an anti-backdriving drill earlier, and I could have the Makita microwave, that's legitimately cool but it's also ungodly expensive and I wouldn't buy one even if I was already on the Makita battery platform. DeWalt's radio is probably nicer but I don't even use the Ryobi radio I've got, so I don't think that matters.
A universal battery WOULD be great, just for competition's sake, but in practice I don't think it would change much for me. I'm already basically there, through a combination of a very versatile base platform that goes most places, and the ability to chop things up and make new stuff when I want to go even further.
> It's also the broadest system, with everything from drills and saws, to lights and fans, to soldering irons and dremel-like tools.
A little over the top sometimes, like do they really need 20 different cordless leaf blowers? Or is that just so they can brag about how many tools the ONE+ system has?
Should I get a P21110? Or a P21140? Or maybe a RY40412VNM or PBLLB01K?
Absolutely over-the-top. They need 2 of any given tool. But over time they introduce new ones, and so it doesn't bother me that there are a dozen different drills over the years. What does bother me, as you've pointed out, is that they'll introduce 20 years worth of different tools _all at the same time._ Like, no, just pick the good one and the cheap one and scrap the rest, please.
I don't count that crap when I say broadest, though. I mean, there's a battery-powered pump which is great for draining or loading medium-sized vessels, where you don't want to suck-start a siphon or maybe gravity goes the wrong way. Milwaukee makes one too, but I don't think anyone else does -- there's a third-party one that takes Makita batteries and a different third-party one that takes DeWalt batteries, but that's it. Or there's a heatgun now, I think a few brands have those now too. There's hot-melt glue guns, only Ryobi has first-party, everyone else is using adapters and stuff.
That's what I mean when I say broadest, there's just a ridiculous variety of stuff on those batteries, like the overlap of all other brands combined, and a lot of it is really useful. I can't count how many times a corded hot-glue gun launched itself into my lap because I snagged the cord while moving around, and that simply can't happen with the cordless one.
The real one that made the red army annoyed (because Ryobi is kinda the same company) is that garage door opener - discontinued now, but the idea of a battery backup for your garage door is pretty cool: https://www.ryobitools.com/products/details/33287177103
Nobody really cares about the Makita coffee maker or microwave or whatever, but Ryobi has some interesting things.
Lowe's Kobalt had a kids drivable toy car that took their batteries, that was kind of nice. I just added an adapter to take M18 for my daughter's toy jeep, now it can flip itself over.
Yeah what I'm complaining about is more the "depth" of the product line than the breadth.
I don't own anything toooo unusual, the weirdest is probably the hot glue gun that you mentioned. It's great as a cordless tool because the cord on a hot glue gun is always trying to tip it over and burn your arm or pull it off the table.
And of course they do have two different hot glue guns. One where the battery locks into the handle, and one where the battery goes into a base station and the gun is a smaller unpowered piece that you pick up with some thermal mass to stay hot until it goes back on the base to heat up again.
This exists elsewhere - the local fire truck has some giant battery powered fan that uses Milwaukee batteries, but the fan isn't made by Milwaukee. (They also had M28 which I'd never seen in person).
A standard battery interface doesn't change the sad reality that third-party batteries are all, without exception, bullshit wastes of money due to being practically DOA.
I've always needed to buy first-party batteries to replace worn out ones, and if I'm doing that it doesn't make any difference to me if their interface is proprietary or standard.
Sell me batteries worth a damn, then we can talk about standards.
Not my experience, but I think the main argument here is, that every time you want a new tool, you will have to get one from the brand you already have, or also buy new batteries. That annoys me already.
It is much more annoying for a home user than for a professional user.
Once you have two battery types, you might as well have a few. People seem to be quite fine with M12 and M18, which are only compatible on the charger itself.
It is much less important to have access to multiple brands now compared to 20 years ago, as most of the brands have acceptable tools across the line even if they're not all the "best in class".
> A standard battery interface doesn't change the sad reality that third-party batteries are all, without exception, bullshit wastes of money due to being practically DOA.
But that doesn’t matter! If, say, Makita, Bosch and Hilti started using standard, interchangeable batteries, you could use Makita, Bosch, or Hilti batteries in tools by any of the three brands. No need for third party batteries.
> it's just voltage and all you have to do is step up or down.
It isn't quite that easy. The high-output 18v batteries can dump over 100 Amps for short durations. Stepping that kind of power up or down isn't really possible in any consumer device.
The good news is that Dewalt 20V and Milwaukee 18V are actually the same: they are both 5 li-ion cells. The no-load voltage of a li-ion cell is ~4V, the voltage under load is 3.6V. This is why you can use Milwaukee batteries on Dewalt devices and vice-versa.
One of the nicest trends for me has been pairing them with 3D printed adapters and accessories, which has really started to dent manufacturers' attempts at proprietary accessory platforms. I've bought or commissioned 3D-printed track rail adapters to use a DeWalt router on a Kreg track, a DeWalt 20V battery adapter to power 18V Ryobi tools, and dust nozzle adapters to connect my shopvac hose just about every tool, and they all just seem to work without much fuss.
That adapter sounds amazing. I love the Kreg rails, but never thought of the potential for using it with a router. Are you using it with a trim router?
One thing that excites me as a gear-head is the availability of affordable electric impact tools. When I was a kid, the only folks that had impact drivers were mechanics as they required an air compressor to operate. Now I can walk into Home Depot or even Walmart and walk out with a cordless impact driver that's just as good as the old air powered tools for <$100.
Just as good? It's gotten to where the normal cordless are way better than most non-top-tier air.
And if those at home have never used an impact driver "because a drill is the same thing" you need to try one. I love the Surge (because the hydraulics makes it quieter), but any impact driver is a whole new world.
Toolguyd (guide, get it) is good writing, and he's obviously annoyed that few manufacturers talk to "old media" anymore (he is more like a newspaper writer than a social media influencer).
I sometimes wonder what percentage of "tool sales" are "prosumer" - it's pretty obvious with cameras, for example, that some are designed to be sold to prosumers and some are designed to be sold into professional industries.
I don't know what it's like in the US, but in the several european countries I've lived in the real "pro market" is all leasing, not buying. just like their vehicles, they'll have a fleet of tools with on-site support contracts
I might be wrong but I believe this is done for accounting purposes, because of the generally ultra repressive taxation system in place. It makes it easier to extract more value if that makes sense...
Even in the USA there's often business advantages to leasing (you can deduct the entire year's cost of the lease immediately) vs buying to own (you have to depreciate on the depreciation scale).
I think that might be a big difference US vs EU - many US builders are technically independent contractors, and so "buy their own" - there are large companies with fleet-managed tools (see things like OneKey) but it's not as common as it may be elsewhere.
I cut down and removed some forty trees of heaven, ranging forty to sixty feet tall and up to ten inches in diameter, using an M12 8" pruning saw. I went through a lot of batteries, a couple chains, and almost a full bottle of bar oil, but I didn't need to hassle with a small engine.
They make an M18 version now that would've been nice to have at the time.
I think you hit on one of the great benefits of cordless electric tools, especially those that have recently taken over the lawn&garden market.
For so long if you had even a small yard you had to have a mower, an edger, a hedge trimmer, a weed wacker, maybe a small chainsaw for standard homeowner tasks throughout the year. Each of these had small gas motors in them that required priming, starting, gas, oil, lubricant (for chains and other things), and potential tuneups of the throttle and small components like that. It was honestly a huge pain.
The worst is that you had to have all these small gas cans around the garage that were premixed with different ratios of oil for many of these engines.
For a homeowner you needed these tools to keep your yard looking good. But they don't get an abundant amount of work. You might fill a weedwacker up with fuel 2-3 times all summer. A hedge trimmer once. Then in the winter you need to try to drain the fuel so bad fuel didn't rot in there. Then undo it all in the spring. It was a lot of work and small engines just deteriorate while sitting still.
We have seen electric tools in the form of drills and drivers for a while. But they had never been powerful enough before to operate a huge lawn mower or weed wacker reliably. Now they are and it makes home lawn and garden so much nicer. When you start one of these tools you only have to make sure the battery is charged. It starts with one click. No priming, no mixing oil, no winterizing. Not to mention it is quieter.
I get that professional lawn care might still need the power of gas tools for a while longer, but homeowners can finally kiss that world goodbye. I replaced my mower about 5 years ago. Then the next time I had trouble with the weedwacker I replaced it with an electric one of the same company and batter system. Since then I have bought a leaf blower, a hedge trimmer, and a small garden tiller, and a pole saw, all that use the same battery system. It has been amazing and truly simplified my life.
Absolutely, small engines are a pain, and the more you have, the more pain they are. Especially when they don't get used often.
The pruning saw was as much as cheap gasoline chainsaw, but it fires right up with minimal maintenance (charging, bar oil), without having to mix and pour fuel. I can put it in storage for a few years and it'll run just as well as the day I left it.
I also have some Greenworks 60V tools, including a mower and trimmer, and they work great for my yard.
The chainsaws (both the small ones and the bigger ones) are a real example of where you can look at something that has substantially improved and is actually usable now. The M18 chainsaw is perfectly usable and much easier than firing up the big gas one.
I guess those are Stihl models? I think you're overestimating the inconvenience of a small engine. It's possible that I'm underestimating the convenience of a battery... I do have an old-school bias probably. But if I were cutting that much I'd rather stop and refuel once, maybe twice than have to keep swapping batteries. I guess it's heavier too... I think of it as a workout.
Edit: I guess I should disclose my comparison, which is a Stihl MS260 that's probably 20-30 years old. Never a problem starting and I'm guessing easier to repair than an electric one.
Milwaukee. As another commenter pointed out, it's not so much that small engines are inconvenient to use as that they're also inconvenient to store and maintain. Especially when it's a seldom used tool.
Especially the newer gas ones. Old gas tools were loose, carbureted, and flexible; they'd run on damn near anything burnable.
New ones often have a bunch of stuff on them to reduce emissions, which makes them more complicated (some are fuel injected!) and you have to do things like drain out the ethanol-injected gas so it doesn't go bad over the winter, etc, etc.
I'm just sad my snowblower died before electric ones really took off.
Totally agree. The only problem is that batteries are so expensive you need to align yourself with a brand so that you can swap batteries between tools. I wish there was a standard battery spec, so that they were interoperable between brands - but that's unlikely to happen.
We bought into the DeWALT system and have been pretty pleased.
Air compressor (stays in truck)
16" Chainsaw (I've cut up several large trees no sweat)
Handheld leaf blower (way quieter than gas)
Torque wrench (stays in truck for wheel emergencies, I tow)
Drill (for around the house)
We recently had our first battery die which I feel is good luck considering we've had some of the tools for years. The next tools will probably be a pressure washer, and a reciprocating saw.
Same here. I've been very pleased with their cordless yard stuff and tools. Angle grinder, reciprocating saw, drill, driver, impact driver, lawn trimmer, 16" chainsaw, and a corded mitre saw. I will admit I was skeptical at first about battery-based high-torque tools like a chainsaw, but I asked several people and got good recommendations. That chainsaw has been an absolute beast.
Also bought the job site radio which I absolutely love. BT, corded but also acts as a battery charger OR can be powered off battery.
We've got two dual chargers, several singles, and bag full of batteries up to 60V. Were in it to win it, now, with DeWalt, but they have yet to let me down.
It does depend on what you're doing. I have a small driver that fits in my belt pouch easily -- the battery doesn't last long so it's always on shuffle at the charger (I have two) but it's light and small and convenient when crawling around or climbing ladders.
I have a 300 rpm corded beast of a drill for mixing concrete, and I wish you luck doing that with a battery-powered one. This thing sounds like a land rover climbing a hill in low gear, and puts out about as much torque.
I've got a cordless framing nailer that sinks 3 1/2" nails with ease, and isn't that much heavier than an air one, without the hassle of hoses and compressors.
I've got a corded chop saw with its own fold-out stand, usually that thing is planted in one place for the duration of the job.
Oh yeah, and I have five different chargers for the whole menagerie of tools, because why would there ever be a standard?
There isn't a one-size-fits all solution -- some tools are better corded, some more practical with battery power. It depends on your use and situation.
For the small driver I recommend the Bosch 12 volt tools. They can be bought on sale for a good price. And the batteries last for a very long time. I rarely charge mine, but I only use them occasionally.
A cordless jobsite tablesaw - probably. At least in the US you may be a long ways from a working outlet when doing rough framing, installing subfloor, etc.
Cordless table saw may not make sense for a DIYer. But then again, if you are space constrained, why not give yourself more flexibility on where to use your tool?
Unplugging the battery is easier as you don't even have to follow the cord or bend over to reach it. The battery is right there.
It can be useful if you've got the saw set up as an island, there's no cord to either dangle from the ceiling, or trip over on the floor. An island setup is super practical for material handling.
If the battery can get you through a useful number of cuts, yeah, it has some real advantages.
Mains can be killed at a distance, in the doorway, by someone not even getting near the machine.
Losing a mains "all stop" (and a mains breaker at that) seems to me to be an odd safety choice.
I think cordless tools make a lot of sense for anything you have to hold or direct with motion. I'm just not convinced by the need elsewhere, particularly on the most dangerous tools.
I guess a door-located emergency-stop button is standard in your country? It's not here. I've never seen one in either a home shop or a commercial cabinet shop.
That's interesting. I wouldn't walk over to the door to isolate power before changing a blade, for instance, I'd just unplug the cord or the battery. That lets the rest of the shop continue running while I have my hands inside the one specific machine.
The cordless work site is entirely about contractors, who have to haul tools to every job. Once you have a sufficient battery fleet, everything is much easier at a jobsite. No looking for outlets, no running extension cords, and the tools are usually lighter while being sufficient.
I have an old Porta Cable 505 finish pad sander (maybe abound 50yo) that I would not want to give up. It will run all day every day. One nice thing about it is its flat top. I can turn it over and use it as a sanding table for small parts. I think some of the attraction to new tools are the flashy tennis shoe colors and shapes.
In a shop setting cords are not bad.
Old tools were often just made to run forever and are serviceable. Parts are getting harder to find but maybe 3D printers will help and McMaster Carr (a great web site) has lot of stuff.
Old pro tools are often an order of magnitude cheaper than anything new and will work just as well they always have.
I love my cordless Ridgid drill and driver. I will buy some new stuff but will stick with used (and even vintage) when I can.
Maybe explain why you need to buy very expensive tools and everything else is garbage?
Just about every contractor around here (USA based) is using Milwaukee, Dewalt or Makita. These folks make a living with their tools and don't have patience for junk. Even lower tier brands like Ryobi are more than capable for home use. I got a lot done around the house with a basic Hitachi drill and corded Skil saw before treating myself to some fancier stuff.
I've run into a few contractors who have Ryobi as well, and are fine with them. They're sufficient for a lot of tasks, and most contractors end up with multiples of any tool anyway. One actually said "I may go through two Ryobi tools while you go through one, but it's still cheaper, and I worry less about losing or wrecking it."
I've yet to meet a contractor who's brand loyal to the point of only using that brand. Most have two or three brands they tend to go to.
There is the market segmentation to be considered: Ryobi is owned by the same holding that owns Milwaukee so they make sure a Ryobi tool does not perform on par with a more expensive Milwaukee equivalent. So if you do, say, electrical work, you can use a Ryobi impact because you don't really care how fast you screw a dozen fasteners you'll need in a whole day. But if you install cabinets/decks and need to put in thousands fasteners a day then you will want the fastest impact, which won't be a Ryobi by far.
As for brand loyalty - it comes from the fact that batteries are more expensive than the tools. A handyman or a two people crew on a small job can have five different batteries with five different charges for ten different tools in the truck without much problem. A crew of ten people working on the same site for days will need multiple batteries per tool and if they try to use different systems they will end up with people waiting for a free outlet so they can charge and work for a couple more hours before they will need to wait again. It's much easier to set up one charging point and pool charged batteries for everyone to use.
I know some contractors with Harbor Freight tools that they're moderately annoyed haven't died yet. Buy it once to throw away and it just keeps working.
Lots of the super price brands like Festool are more ... showoff I almost feel.
When we bought the house, I bought some corded yard tools (weed whacker and leaf blower) because I was assuming battery ones are weak and unreliable but the reality is that operating these things while wired in is just a huge pain in the ass. Meanwhile my neighbors who have battery powered equivalents are doing just fine. My mower (which came with the house) is battery powered and works great.
The Ryobi drill I bought when I moved in here almost 3 years ago has been working great and I literally had to charge it only once in this time (I guess I don't use it often but the fact that a power tool maintained charge for 1.5 years is impressive in itself.)
I guess I also took a bet on the battery world when I bought a hybrid. Likewise going strong going into the 3rd year.
Maybe it's time to stop thinking of batteries as weak and unreliable. But they are definitively an additional point of failure and complexity.