Do SDS drills lose their oomph as they get older?

Well no, as SteveW says it is some sort of pneumatic system, perhaps a bit like a jackhammer? But this implies ports or some other type of valves that are operated by the movement of the "hammer", so there is scope for wear and valve leakage there.

Reply to
newshound
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IME all SDS systems recommend periodic greasing in this way. If you don't, you get fretting wear which will eventually cause the bit to seize in the chuck.

Reply to
newshound

Crankshaft bearings wear too.

Reply to
newshound

Although motor brush wear usually manifests as very sluggish or intermittent movement for a relatively short time, followed by failure. Rather than steady degradation which is more consistent with mechanical wear (or perhaps hardening of rubber seals).

Reply to
newshound

Diamonds burn. Nice CO2 out of them.

Reply to
dennis

And the owners :-)

Reply to
Andrew

yes, but use the black stuff that comes with a CV boot repair kit. Ordinary grease will rot the outer rubber nose.

Reply to
Andrew

Its usually a swash bearing style drive, the arm on which moves a cylinder or plunger back and fourth, and that is pneumatically coupled to a free sliding hammer.

So I suppose some wear on that interface could make the pneumatic couple weaker with age. Having said that, by SDS is probably at least 15 years old, and I have not noticed any drop off in performance (other than when I had to replace the armature that is!)

Reply to
John Rumm

Really? I'd be surprised if that wasn't nitrile. Certainly mine copes fine with ordinary mineral oil grease.

Reply to
newshound

Hmm, perhaps I'm either imagining it then, or I've found some harder walls than before. I might also have been spoiled because I borrowed a nearly-new Makita for a short time.

Reply to
nothanks

It possibly depends on the internal design of the drill as well. Some of the more basic ones need a continuous supply of internal grease it seems, whereas the better ones only need the occasional bit of grease on the back of the bit.

Reply to
John Rumm

The manual for mine says to use any, ordinary, lithium grease.

SteveW

Reply to
Steve Walker

My Bosch drills came with a sachet of silicon grease.

Bill

Reply to
Bill Wright

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