Good pricing on quality cordless tools in the GTA?

It's all about batteries and chargers for cordless. Once they go it's expensive without a good warranty. it's cheaper to buy a new tool, unless you are a contractor zillions of them around. It's hard to beat the combo sales in big box stores.
 
mxs said:
It's all about batteries and chargers for cordless. Once they go it's expensive without a good warranty. it's cheaper to buy a new tool, unless you are a contractor zillions of them around. It's hard to beat the combo sales in big box stores.
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Yeah, I might wait a little longer and see what comes up on sale. I don't have to buy immediately. Just looking for good leads and I'll pick something up over the next month or so. By the way, the PA special is a lower-end combo with half the battery capacity of the originally posted combo kit.
 
Got the Bosch set last spring, on sale at Lowes. Been using it all year to build my house with no complaints.
 
DownUnder said:
Great points. The issue with cordless tools though is that once you buy a certain brand your kinda stuck with them unless you want to carry 3-4 chargers and 10+ different batteries to every job site. For cordless I recommend sticking to one brand.
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Your bang on the money with cordless batteries.
I went to the cellar and did inventory.
2 - 7.2v makita drills, now useless
2 -9.5v makita drill drivers, 1- 9.5v tilesaw, 1- 9.5v trim router, all pretty much useless
1 -18v dewalt drill, its ok
2- ryobi 18v drills, they're ok
4- 12v King/Dakota drills , they-re ok, use 3 different batteries....
box of assorted Metabo, Fien, Hitachi cordless in various states of disassembly

there are 9 chargers and 19 batteries to go to the recycler.

My next cordless drill will be lithium ion, please Jesus could they keep a similar battery style for more than 5yrs?
 
Dewalt has has the same style batteries for forever. The new 20v batteries that they switched to is their own design whereas before they leased the tech from another company. Which is why the batteries were so expensive. The new ones are like $50 and last just as long as the most recent 18v but are much lighter and charge faster.

I usually go to mississauga hardware for mystuff aswell.
 
Batteries shot?

Open your bad battery packs up! They use standard cells (usually SC), if you have tools with bad batteries it is dirt cheap to rebuild the batteries yourself! Otherwise feel free to give them to me (if it is all too complicated)!
 
backmarkerducati said:
Batteries shot?

Open your bad battery packs up! They use standard cells (usually SC), if you have tools with bad batteries it is dirt cheap to rebuild the batteries yourself! Otherwise feel free to give them to me (if it is all too complicated)!
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I have a Ridgid 18V Li-Ion drill that should be ok for more home use. Their "lifetime warranty" is crap, so I might take that route.. New cells, new brushes and she'll be just fine for around the house :)

Note: I have nothing against Ridgid tools in general, and most of my major hand tools are that brand, but the "professional grade" drill didn't stand up to home use, so I'd be scared to have my living depend on their cordless tools.
 
Been using Milwaukee and Makita cordless drills professionally. They're both solid, as are the batteries. These things are exposed to harsh elements, go through multiple charge cycles daily, and are overall treated like 'construction tools'. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend either. The Milwaukee batteries were nice with the auto shutoff as well as a charge status display, but one of the chargers died... take that for what its worth. The drills themselves have been great.

Ridgid, meh. Bosch for cordless drills, meh. I've had DeWalts and they all still work. Their new drills and batteries are nice, and very strong, but I have no personal experience with them so can't comment on longevity.

Buy a Milwaukee or Makita combo when it goes on sale- got my last set for $279.
 
What do you guys think of this combo? http://www.mississaugahardware.com/store/product_info.php/manufacturers_id/11/products_id/1615 The only possible issue is that I see is that the product line was introduced in 2009, so parts availability may become an issue a few years down the line. I will test blackmarkerducati's battery cell replacement method on that spare Ridgid that I have lying around, but if it's too much of a hassle or Bosch uses non-standard cells in the Litheon line, I'd be screwed.
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