18V tools: Makita, Ryobi, or DeWalt?

[Jimk]

Adapters?

[nothanks]

I'm tempted to spend some of the kid's inheritance on 18V tools (they'll probably be less-than impressed to inherit used tools instead of cash - kids today! ;-) ) and would like some advice from those who use Mak, Ryobi, DeWalt, etcetera. I've only just started looking and had expected that Ryobi would be significantly cheaper, but the price difference is not so great. I've had a Ryobi scroll saw and a chop saw for many years and both are best described as "adequate", but the chop saw has recently died and the Bosch replacement is hugely better (and hugely more expensive).

What do people think of their main brand (18V) tools? Has anyone here tried the battery adapters for Ryobi-Mak-DeW?

[Andy Bennet]

I would say the 3 main brands are DeWalt, Makita and Milwaukee. Personally I think they are much of a muchness - but the ranges of available tools do vary slightly. I wanted a few garden type tools as well - hedge trimmer/weed whacker as well as all the normal workshop stuff. You need to look at all your needs for the forseeable and make sure the brand you go for covers it. Once you have decided you are pretty much locked in - the batteries are expensive to change ship. Once you have a couple of batteries you only need to buy 'bare' tools in the future. There are many clone batteries on the market - IMHO they are all crap so avoid.

Personally if it helps I opted for Makita and have no regrets.

[charles]

I've used Ryobi One+ for many years. Now that Lithium batteries are available, I'm very happy and have bought two more (gardening) tools during lockdown. You have to shop around for good prices, though.

[nothanks]

I hadn't considered Milwaukee, but from a quick look they seem to have a longer guarantee, and a bit more oomph than the Mak for about the same cost. More study needed.

I use petrol tools in the garden so that's not an issue. I fully understand the battery lock-in problem but there seem to be adapters for some of the battery/manufacturer combinations.

[Tim Streater]

At the theatre I volunteered at in California, everyone used Makitas, nothing else. Mind you, that was 35 years ago.

[Andy Burns]

Making your first choice of tool is important, as unless you like a garage full of incompatible tools/batteries/chargers you'll tend to stick to the first brand you buy.

I'm all Makita and very happy with the 18V and 2x18V tools I have, wish I'd got 18V versions of some of the tools where I stuck with 240V a couple of years ago ...

[John Rumm]

I have had a couple of combination line trimmer machines from Ryobi - admittedly not battery, but the general experience has put me off the rest of their stuff (short life due to poor design, and bad choice of materials)

(IIRC Ryobi are owned by TTI, and they position it as their "mid range" brand with brands like power devil at the bottom, and Milwalkee at the top).

I would expect the 18V LiIon tools from Mak, Bosch, Dewalt, Milwalkee, and Hikoki (Hitachi) to all be pretty decent these days.

For years I ran some 18V NiMh makita kit that was *very* good, and some

14.4V dewalt NiCd/NiMh stuff that was a bit disappointing to be honest. I wanted to add more tools, but also I had replaced the batts on the Makita kit twice (in 10+ years or so) and was looking at the third swap, but realised it was getting hard to find the range of tools in the old format. So a few years ago I sold off the dewalt stuff, and jumped to the LXT platform for the Makita.

All in all very pleased that I did. The range of tools is vast[1] (250+ machines), and the performance exceptionally good.

[1] Although there are a couple of gaps - for example if you want an 18V framing nailer that does not need gas they don't yet have one (Hikoki, have had that for ages, and Milwalkee also now)

I started with combi drill, ID, circ saw and angle drill (that replaced all the original Mak and Dewalt kit, and have added Brushless angle grinder, hedge trimmer, and line trimmer, plus an extra dual charger.

(The hedge trimmer in particular surpassed expectations - I can do lots of serious work with it, and think, "this battery must be close to done now", push the charge state button, and find its still reading full or close to it!)

Personally I quite like it that Mak are sticking with 18V as their main battery, and just use two of them in machines that need the extra power, rather than adding a whole new 36V battery platform. So you get the choice of running 36V with no new investment in batteries etc if you need a chainsaw or 9" grinder etc.

I have a couple of adaptors that let me power my old NiCd/NiMh Makita kit from LXT LiIon batteries. They work ok.

[Chris Green]

They vary. I have a collection of Ryobi 'Expand-it' tools and two electric and two petrol power heads. The tool ends (brush cutter, strimmer, hedge trimmer, rotavator) have all been pretty robust and reliable. The strimmer and rotavator get quite heavy use (we have a 9 acre smallholding).

The power heads are more 'variable' shall we say. The 2-stroke petrol power unit is awful, difficult to start when cold, impossible to start when hot and it was like this from new. The 4-stroke petrol unit is much better, easy to start hot or cold, runs relatively quietly etc. It's not perfect, it's needed a bit of maintenance, in particular the mixture adjustement tends to drift but it's easy to change with the right tool so that's not a big issue.

The electric power heads are, again, not perfect but they're OK given the amount of quite heavy work they get here. Looking back I see that I bought my first bits of Expand-It back in 2008 so they're 12 years old now, not too bad for fairly inexpensive hardware.

[newshound]

I have had Ryobi but my main kit is now Makita (running on NiCad, but you can now get third party NiMH replacements that use the same charger). I'm moving over to Lidl 20V Li-Ion for "less frequently used" stuff since it looks as though my Makita combi drill and impact driver will both last forever.

[Andy Burns]

No worries about my impact driver, but the keyless chuck on the combi went graunchy for a bit, seems to have recovered ...

[John Rumm]

Yup to be fair I still have some of the Ryobi attachments, and they work ok on my Stihl power head.

I found my two stroke was ok ish for the short time it worked. However at some point something fell off inside it, and it then ingested it. The results were not pretty:

I had not intended to get another, but was tempted by a very good deal for a new 4 stroke (about £60 IIRC).

I found that since many of its internal components were plastic it was a bit wafty from the start. First the mixture drifted - getting the right adjustment tool helped a bit, but in the end the timing drifted in a non adjustable way as well and it became impossible to keep running reliably.

In the end I paid out for a Stihl power head, which starts and runs reliably, has far more power, better fuel economy, and works at any angle.

I think mine lasted about 7 years all in (the 2 stroke died at about 18 months IIRC). The pruning saw attachment is still working well, the auto feed line trimmer went on for a far bit until one day it flew apart in use - one bit went flying through the open patio doors, and just missed hitting my son on the head! So I decided it was time to retire that. The hedge trimmer is ok, but then that was a Husqvarna attachment anyway.

[John Rumm]

You can also get adaptors that let you use LXT batts on the old format tools (although you will need a new charger).

My original combi and ID from about 2004 are still going strong that way.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

It's a quandary, isn't it? Those Lidl tools likely outperform the Ni-cad Makitas of not so long ago, and at a fraction of the price. I bought the earlier Lidl 18 volts ones - combi drill, jigsaw and circular saw with a couple of extra batteries too, and they've been great for my DIY use.

One nice thing about the current Lidl 20v range is the choice of two battery capacities.

[PeterC]

I've at least 5 Makita tools, mains or battery, but went for Bosch Pro fo a

10.8V drill/driver and an 18V combi, mainly because they're about the shortest ones. DeWalt always look long - I haven't actually looked at the specs. The hedge trimmer is Bosch green - I would have got the Pro but it was too long for my uses. The green seems to be quite happy withe minor challenges, such as 35+ year old cahain-link fence wire (rather thicker than the modern crap) in good condition.

[newshound]

Yes, although you have to wait for them to come into stock if you need one suddently. The secret is to look on their "offers" pages. "Next weeks" is dated, the one after that will be for the week after.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Yup. I look at the offers each week. In better times, an offer that got me to their store also got (most) of the grocery shop for the week too.

However, in a year's time, the range will likely be different.

[nothanks]

I wish I'd known that Ryobi attachments work with a Stihl head. I have the Stihl Combi system (brush cutter, hedge trimmer, pole saw, blower and a 1m extension) - an excellent device but the cost made me wince. I look forward to the day when I can justify replacing the Dakota chainsaw with a Stihl and end the "start ya bastard" sessions before giving-up and getting the electric saw out.

[Tim+]

I?m still waiting for my £79 Parkside chainsaw to die but whilst I?ve had to do some repairs the engine has been ridiculously reliable. It very nearly *always* starts first time. Ten pumps on the primer, full choke, ignition off, three pulls on the starter, choke off, ignition on, one pull on the starter and away it goes 99% of the time. It even started first time *after I told someone that it would*!

Somehow seems all wrong for a two stroke engine. ;-)

Tim

[John Rumm]

They do, but with some caveats...

The ryobi attachments don't have the self centring gizmo that makes them easy to get the inner shaft to mate with the end of the Stihl. On some, I found that drilling out the little rivet at the end of the ryobi shaft, and in another case actually trimming 5mm off the outer shaft making the inner protrude a little made them much easier to mate *and* couple drive to the business end.

Husqvarna attachments also fit (I bought their pole hedge trimmer in preference to the ryobi since it allowed the end angle to adjust). One day will re-engineer the knob that tightens the pivot to stop it flapping about in the breeze half the time!

Yup that is one thing to be said for the lekky or cordless versions :-)

I got the 18V hedge trimmer ostensibly so SWMBO could use it (there is no way she would go to the effort of getting, setting up, fuelling, and starting the petrol one!) Now having used it, unless I need the reach of the long one, I don't bother with the loud heavy smelly version (which to be fair is a fairly cheap heavy lump I got at a cash and carry)