Too bad one can't disassemble a power tool and look at the internal parts before purchasing. Finally had to make repair on 19v Craftsman 1/2" drill and found majority of the internal parts are plastic. Must admit tool was cheaper than most and subject to lot of abuse. Found the trigger mech. broke so about a week ago replaced with another modular plastic assembly and worked fine until another problem developed yesterday. Seem to recall this is not the first time I have repaired a power tool only to have something else go wrong. Starting to move into the 'chuck it' camp and replace at the get go. Not sure I want to look into the internal parts of my Makita, Dewalt, Hatachi, and Milwaukee power tools, may get discouraged. Looking for cordless replacement with 'non plasic' internal parts, any member know of any, suggestions appreciated.

 

Sadly I think most new drills use plastic gears. One of the DeWalts at my school is a two speed. Only 1st works. 2nd just makes a nasty plastic on plastic grinding noise.

 

Ian, affraid you are probably correct, been few yrs. since repairing a 'vintage' Craftsman corded sander and don't recall it having the plastic components, guess as they say 'don't build them like they use to'. Going to disassemble the drill and see if perhaps some part misaligned when I reassembled, even it it works it seems likely a short term fix and not worth the frustration of it crapping out in middle of a project. Don't own any other cordless type power tools, kinda looking at Dewalt as replacement, purchased a used corded drill cheap off ebay, around $9, shipping cost slightly more, for a particular project intending to discard once task was completed. This was couple yrs ago and still going strong, admittedly sounds like a coffee grinder.

 

Older drills seem to keep going, even when they are making all kinds of awful noises. I have an old Milwaukee "hole shooter" that sat in someones shed for years, the chuck had completely rusted up, and it was seized. Got it un seized, the bearings make an awful racket, but it keeps on going

 

i have an old black and decker drill that sounds like hell but works great, i just wish it had a reverse setting...

 

When it comes to cordless drills, most buyers (biggest market) want two things: light and cheap. Neither is conducive to metal internals. So, you can spend $30-50 for some Chinese-made POS that somebody else has slapped a label on, or you can spend $150-300 or more for a cordless drill that is made to last. I have a Porter-Cable 14.4V (second one--trigger gave up the ghost on the first), which does have metal gears (partly because it is also a hammer drill). It is heavy, but I don't care--rarely do I use it for more than a few minutes at a time.

Jason

 

I have some "vintage" Craftsman power tools that my grandfather gave to me.
A 1/2" drill, circular saw, and a 6" disc sander. They are all aluminum bodies, heavy(I like to think of them as beefy), and torquey.
They are good looking power tools and I would think they would cost 5 times as much to make as the plastic stuff, but they are probably over 30 years old.
Cheaper in the long run.

 

Keep your eyes open at swap meets and yard sales for a "classic" Makita, then invest in a new battery? I was too cheap to buy a battery, so I soldered some wire to the contact tabs from a dead battery, held them in place with some scrap wood, and just connect to the nearest 12V battery. That gives plenty of power, considering it was a 9.6V drill.

I have a couple of excellent cordless drills with metal gears. One is a Stanley, 1/4" chuck. The other is a two speed breast drill, 3/8" chuck, a British brand I'd never heard of. Both use no electricity or batteries at all... just turn the crank like an eggbeater.

 

Hi Dave,
Unfortunately, almost all of the brands have a lot of plastic parts in them now. Some, like deWalt, have several models of varying quality. I used to think their all metal gear case, three speed DeWalt 18V was the best. I still have one. The big problem I have had with DeWalt is that their $85.00 batteries are lousy. I'm down to one reliable battery. I have heard some good things about Bosch , but I don't have one and I have never used one. I have two Metabo grinders that are tough as nails. I don't know about their battery drills, but they might be pretty good. I am thinking of buying the Milwaukee 28V Lithium-Ion battery drill. I have been told by several people that those things will run all day on one battery. They are high dollar, but they have the quality and durability. We have an Industrial supply that is a Milwaukee dealer here. I am going to go and take a look at what they have and closely examine the quality. I will probably buy one. If I were you I would go online and check out each brand you are interested in. Most of the good brands have PDF files of their manuals and parts breakdowns somewhere online. It just takes a while to find them.

IMO, Sears power tools have really gone to the dogs. They don't have anything that I would want. That may be part of the reason they now carry other brands. Everything I have had of theirs excelled in making smoke. Their prices are high and their quality is low. If you want their grade of quality , you can go to HF and buy it a lot cheaper and they will even throw in an extra set of brushes.

Later Man...

 

You can order any or all the parts for that online and make it like new. You can probably get the bearings locally by bearing number.

 

My dad has an 18 volt Li-Ion Milwaukee drill. Its a very compact drill, but when you use it, its amazing how powerful it is. Those people are right, one battery lasts all day, and if it does go dead, it takes 15-25 minutes to charge it up full!

edit: Hmm, I didn't know that Milwaukee still says spare parts ?

 

I'm not sure what you mean by that, but parts are available online. The hole shooter drill is still available, and probably still uses the same bearings. Check out their website. You can Google Milwaukee power tool parts and find several third party vendors. Actually, even Sears is in the online parts business for a number of brands. they are not the best deal though.

Later Man...

 

I have been using Ridgid cordless tools for a couple of years now. They carry a lifetime warranty on everything including the batteries. You just have to make sure that you register them with Ridgid. I had one battery go south and it was promptly replaced.

 

I meant to say has.

Thanks for the information

 

I've finally given up on my old Dewalt "made in the USA" 14v hammer drill. The drill still works but the batteries are worth more than the drill. I've switched to the 18v hammerdrill since I have some of their 18v saws. I like the L style drills (probably because I started out with the old 9.6v makita's) and dewalts one of the few companies that has one even if it's a hammer drill. It is cheaper to buy whole new tool kits just to get the batteries and chargers if you find close outs at good prices.

I've heard good things about the 28v milwalkee's but I have enough batteries lying around and don't really want to add another set that I need to keep charged. The 12v, 14v and 18v dewalts are a big enough pain and they all fit in the same chargers.