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Big Neil

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Obviously if you were building your house yourself, the tools you have are likely to be a mix of makes, ages, conditions and the like. And of course if you had to go and buy everything at once for some reason yopu'd again likely pick a mix of makes for various reasons. But lets say you had to pick a single brand of tools right from your hammer and saw to your mitre saw and nail gun, which would it be. DeWalt, Makita????

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23 minutes ago, Big Neil said:

Obviously if you were building your house yourself, the tools you have are likely to be a mix of makes, ages, conditions and the like. And of course if you had to go and buy everything at once for some reason yopu'd again likely pick a mix of makes for various reasons. But lets say you had to pick a single brand of tools right from your hammer and saw to your mitre saw and nail gun, which would it be. DeWalt, Makita????

 To buy all at once,  would look at the multipacks of 4 or6 tools. Very consideaprable savings indeed.

 

Previously I have been a Metabo shop, as about 8 or 9 tools were inherited.

 

Now I am moving to cordless, new ones are Makita.

 

I am avoiding de Walt as they seem to have split into separate consumer and pro lines, which is a little confusing.

 

I also have a full set of one of the Aldi Workzone offers, which gave me iirc 4 tools and 3 batteries and 3 chargers for about £200. Detail sander, grinder, jigsaw and multi tool iirc. These are the ones I lend, if any. For me they are also the ones I use less regularly, so may pass muster.

 

For workshop style heavy tools, I might mix my brands.

 

F

Edited by Ferdinand
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Do you find the Makita to be of decent Quality? I had one of their cordless drills for a while and it was certainly passable. I've not really used any recent DeWalt stuff, but what I have seems to be decent.

 

I'd like to try some Milwaukee stuff as I 've heard good things about them.

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I was watching a SkillBuilder group tool review the other day and they commented that sometimes a tool brand will have a gap in their product range which is filled by subcontracting out to a generic manufacturer who will clad the machine with the brand's coloured plastic. Probably less of a problem with the most respected names.

 

The key decision you face is which brand for cordless tools i.e. which battery & charger system to lock into.

 

It is early days for me and my build but I am leaning towards Screwfix-Erbauer for 240v tools because the 2 year guarantee will hopefully match my build duration. For cordless I will probably lock into Makita because I want the new generation pulse-strike impact driver. 

Edited by epsilonGreedy
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31 minutes ago, Big Neil said:

[...]

say you had to pick a single brand of tools right from your hammer and saw to your mitre saw and nail gun, which would it be. 

[...]

 

Thats exactly the problem I had at the beginning of the build. No tools to speak of before I started, I had to price tools into the cost of the house, bearing in mind that I'll be re-selling some.

 

I chose Bosch.

Because of the price point and basic quality. And not just because I'm Deutsch. Lots to criticise about Bosch: clunky, teutonic, poor design sometimes, heavy. But I'm not going to use them for much longer. Would love Festool, and every 2 or 3  months or so I buy a bit of Festool for later : crosscut saw, MFT, Domino jointer, others in the pipeline.

 

I hate the way that Bosch seem to be  resistant to constructive customer feedback. Try posting a review of their kit on their website - as opposed to how wonderful their [xyz] is. Very insular, lazy-minded, touchy, arrogant. 

 

Vorsprung durch Technik UND Kritik !

 

 

 

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4 hours ago, Ferdinand said:

 To buy all at once,  would look at the multipacks of 4 or6 tools. Very consideaprable savings indeed.

 

 

I was nearly temped by a DeWalt coreless multi pack but then realized they were shifting older brushed motor models in the pack and finally I doubted the power of a cordless SDS drill in the pack.

Edited by epsilonGreedy
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I ended up with loads of Makita stuff, pretty much by accident.  Makita sponsored a boat build/race challenge, I won a set of Makita tools years ago and once you have battery packs, chargers etc it makes sense to just stick with the same make, so you can interchange battery packs etc. 

 

Having said that I've yet to have a problem with any of the Makita stuff, and some of it has been seriously abused.  One drill has been used for boat racing*, where it gets too hot to hold, yet it's still my most used Makita drill.

 

*Makita have been long-term supporters of the Water Craft Makita Cordless Canoe Challenge.

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I'm a Makita user and love them - went LXT and now pretty much use all the time.

 

I have looked at the new Fein multi range - same drill body but interchangeable chucks, drivers etc and I do like it a lot. Not cheap but if its like the multimaster then will last.

 

Heard mixed about the new Milwaukee range - only 12v and down on power against the LXT but comparable on price. 

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Slightly off topic. Is it feasible to buy a comprehensive set of tools for resale at the end of a build? I saw such fine set when I visited @PeterStarck 's lovely build last year.

 

In doing so, my instincts would be go for the most popular quality brand to aid resale. To me, Makita seems to be that based on reading on here over the time since I have been a member. 

 

I imagine the buy/sell loss could be modest by this approach but am I right? Is there a thriving second-hand market in Makita tools or are they like cars, depreciating precipitously?

Edited by Dreadnaught
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If I could start again and offset the price against a large job. I would probably look into dewalt flexvolt because they can offer a lot of power through a single battery. Other than that it's pretty much pick a colour or see who has good offers on. I like blue so I run makita but all the top brands are pretty comparable. Except festool. I dislike how overpriced they are and how arrogant most of there owners tend to be about it..... Imo

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Interesting to hear some good things about Makita. I will look at their product line more. I had wondered about DeWalt. I had wondered that as they are familied uyp with Stanley and Black and Decker, if that might be the way a distinction is made between low-middle-high end tools

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10 minutes ago, Construction Channel said:

Except festool. I dislike how overpriced they are and how arrogant most of there owners tend to be about it..... Imo

 

You've never met a Festool area rep then.....?? Last demo I saw, there were no prices on anything, on the basis of if you have to ask, you can't afford...

 

5 minutes ago, Big Neil said:

Interesting to hear some good things about Makita. I will look at their product line more.

 

If you've got a spare £725 sat doing nothing then this kit from FFX is a stonking deal at £649 inc the free radio if you then add this multitool for £72...

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26 minutes ago, Construction Channel said:

If I could start again and offset the price against a large job. I would probably look into dewalt flexvolt because they can offer a lot of power through a single battery.

 

 

I had to Google that, Fexlvolt = interesting hybrid 18v & 54v battery system.

 

https://www.dewalt.co.uk/products/flexvolt/faq.html

 

A little disconcerting to read that these higher volt batteries need special storage for transit because of regulations.

Edited by epsilonGreedy
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11 minutes ago, PeterW said:

there were no prices on anything, on the basis of if you have to ask, you can't afford

 

That's the bit I don't like. (that I can't afford ?). Its the owners of the tools that get me. They're just so smug about it. Iv always got on well with hilti and snap on owners (similar price and aftercare) but for some reason festool have created a whole new breed of upper-class tradesmen. 

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1 hour ago, Big Neil said:

Do you find the Makita to be of decent Quality?

 

Yes. Mine are all Makita: small and big combi, SDS drill, circular saw, multitool, jigsaw and angle grinder, except the Paslode nail gun. I burned out my original small combi drill but that was doing something silly (drilling concrete). The rest have just worked. People moan about the batteries but I've had no problems with them (touch C24): I run them flat then fully charge them and use them in pretty strict rotation so the issue of them getting unbalanced because one cell gets discharged by the internal electronics doesn't affect me.

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5 minutes ago, Big Neil said:

How about collated screw guns - or screw guns with collated attachments. Seen a lot of reviews and where DeWalt is involved they seem to come out on top. I saw a Hilti review which described their offering as weighty but excellent.

 

I don't see dry lining contractors using collated screw guns. Maybe @nod will comment as it is his field. A friend bought one and it was prone to jamming and the screws are expensive.

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1 minute ago, Mr Punter said:

I don't see dry lining contractors using collated screw guns. Maybe @nod will comment as it is his field. A friend bought one and it was prone to jamming and the screws are expensive.

 

Interesting. Maybe it's another American/British division. When looking at a lot of the instructional videos they seem to use them a lot over there. IN the same vane i've seem a lot more from this side of the pond where guys use those wind up platforms for holding boards in place on the ceiling while fixing, where I haven't seen so many over there.

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