OK, this is a bit of a rant. But it isn't political, and it IS about
> woodworking tools. The recent thread on cordless drills got me
> snooping around as I am on my backup now as another cordless just bit
> the dust. So a replacement is on the to-do list.
>
> I was looking around, and found these reviews (fanboys... please take
> them for what they are worth) tonight. From 12/08:
>
>formatting link> DON"T miss page two. I am wondering if Ryobi is actually getting
> serious about making tools. Looking at their tests, the Ryobi did
> embarrassingly well compared to "professional" type tools.
Hard to say here, I looked at the group and it seems like several writers voiced their opinions with out each testing every drill. That was my impression. The Milwaukee, incredibly light weight, yet is in the middle of the pack as far as weight is concerned. The Ridgid and DeWalt each drove 41 and 33 d3" dry wall screws respectively and each got a "Bottom Line" of 4 red dots, what ever that means and then a Ryobi drove 3 times more and got the same rating. I think there were different testers with different expectations and they did not test all of the drills.
> I was disappointed in my favorite brands, and I am not sure about
> spending $350 on a cordless drill (add in tax before correcting me) to
> get solid performance.
>
> Speaking of disappointment, check this out:
>
>formatting linkrecent years even before B&D got them I have not been impressed with
anything that PC was turning out, especially their cordless drills. Take me back 15-20 years and it was my brand of choice.
This just in,, PC introduces worlds first job work site cordless coffee maker/ blender/ toaster combo.
Snip
> When B&D bought Skil, they ruined that brand. When they bought
> DeWalt, the did the same, but not to the same extent.
Did B&D buy Skil a long time ago? I was under the impression that Bosch was still linked with Skil. And I was under the impression since the 70's that B&D and DeWalt had been linked for some time. Although I think DeWalt was strictly the big tools but do recall when DeWalt started building smaller and bench top tools that looked "exactly" like the B&D tools. I currently have a corded DeWalt that looks like an old B&D drill that I bought for my BIL 18+ years ago. Also I have a B&D router that I bought in
1974 that seemed to change to a yellow color and flash a DeWalt badge on store shelves some 10-15 years later.
And you can
thank a joint partnership with Hitachi for all their strange looking
> green tools; these are all over the map with their performance, mostly > mediocre.
Ok, I suspected that there was an outside influence, which tennis shoe company is it? '~)