Cordless Impact Driver / Drill Sets

Are these worth it? I was looking at a Makita set today and they look nice. I believe it is the 12V max Lithium-Ion 2 Piece Combo Kit Model LCT209W. I’m just a casual home owner type of use.

I have owned a 20 year old cordless Makita drill for years. Finding batteries for it now is nearly impossible. Is that the future of current batteries?

 

Battery sizes and configuration will change over time. I assume the more popular a particular cordless tool is, the longer the battery will be in production. I had an off brand 9.6 volt drill for many years that would accept a 9.6 volt makita battery. That particular style of battery was becoming hard to find just before the drill itself died.

My 'new' drill is a 19.2 volt craftsman and I was shocked at the power difference. Not sure I'd want to step down to a 12 volt. IMO the main thing with cordless tools is to buy them were all your cordless tools take the same battery. Non use is hard on the batteries so if you are always using one of the tools you'll get more use out of the battery.

 

Not sure what which part of "worth it" you are referring to, impact drivers, sets, Makita, etc., but here's my two cents worth. As Mark said, typically you will get more mileage out of the batteries the more you use them, so yes, it makes more sense to have more tools of the same platform. And an impact driver is an excellent choice, because you will use it one time and wonder why you never bought one before; they're that good. As for Makita cordless tools, I have liked them since they, in my opinion, led the way with their 9.6 volt drills, which I felt were the first battery ones with a decent level of power and reliability, and although I do not currently use any of their cordless tools myself, I know others who do, and they seem to still make good tools. Personally, I do not believe that I would buy 12 volt tools, but I know some guys who have them, strictly for around the house, and they seem to do the job. As far as kits, you need to check some prices yourself, but many times you can buy a kit with two or more tools, batteries, and a charger for far less than the components would cost individually, so the kits can be a thrifty way to go.

 

There is a review of 12 volt drill / impact driver sets in Fine Wood Working Feb 2015. What type of battery is in your old drill? Some NiCad batteries can be rebuilt.

 

I use 18v Makita drivers and drill all day long and have 6 batteries, two chargers and 2 drivers and a drill. I find my batteries usually on auction sites as retail is terrible. I would not recommend battery powered tools for homeowner situations. The batteries will die off faster than you can get the use out of them. If it is in the offing, then go no less than 18 volts. I will say, however, my helper uses a 12v Dewalt impact driver and does pretty good with it. As Marksr says, you can feel the torque difference with the increase in voltage, however.

 

Point taken on the batteries. When it comes to understanding batteries, I have a mental block. So many kinds and sizes, my head spins. The tools may sit around for weeks at a time without being used. Not having to mess with extension cords is the appeal to cordless. Do they make trickle chargers that one can keep the batteries on?

The local lumber yard (small town, no other opportunities to look at tools for more than 30 to 80 miles) had a nice looking Milwaukee set, but I don’t remember the type of batteries. Finding stuff on the Makita Web Site is easy. No such kits exist on the Milwaukee site. Very confusing. I’m not stuck on Makita, but they sure make it easy to do research.

 

Check out this Milwaukee page:

Power Tool Combo Kits | Milwaukee Tool

 

I don’t know how you found that page. No amount of searching on the Milwaukee page that I did turned up anything about any combo kits at all. Thank you for the link.

The Milwaukee kits are a lot more expensive than the Makita kits. Are they worth the extra cost?

 

I still have the same question I asked earlier. Do they make trickle chargers for the 18v batteries?

 

I'm not aware of any trickle maintenance type chargers for cordless battery packs. It's best to use them and then recharge them. Having all your cordless tools take the same battery pack increases their use.

 

I have a 25 year old 9.6V Panasonic that I've re-batteried several times. It's torque is similar to my new 20V lithium Dewalt set--but the run time is much shorter. Pick a set with packs held together with screws if you want them to last a long time.