Not long ago a friend gave me an extra DeWalt 18 volt drill he'd come into. I'd been using a 12 volt Makita for over a decade, and I was impressed with how much more torque and battery life the DeWalt had. The same friend also had a DeWalt impact driver from the same series, and again, I was impressed how well this handled mechanical tasks usually relegated to a pneumatic impact driver. But even more impressive was how well the DeWalt worked for driving screws.
A few years ago, the major cordless tool makers started to come out with impact drivers which they marketed not to mechanics, but to carpenters. While today's 18volt cordless drills do a pretty good job of driving screws, they still start to bog down when driving really long screws into hard or resinous wood. The slow, stall, and eventually overheat. But impact drivers don't do this. They work on a different principle, using a motor-driven hammer to repeatedly strike an anvil that drives the output shaft. As the load increases, they switch from spinning to a rapid-fire staccato impact mode, in which every impact turns the screw a bit farther, while the motor continues to spin and bring in cooling air.
I was very pleased to discover that Amazon had a DeWalt impact driver available in a batteryless and caseless package (for those of us who already have a charger and several batteries) for about $125. I purchased mine for a mix of yard projects- this is a great tool for driving the big screws used to tie landscape timbers together- home projects, and motorcycle/scooter maintenance. And amazingly, it's even lighter and more compact than the DEWALT DC759KA Heavy-Duty 18-Volt Ni-Cad 1/2-Inch Cordless Drill/Driver Kit. I'm giving away my Makita 12v drill/driver to a nephew who likes tools and gadgets, and switching 100% to the DeWalt system. Bare-Tool DEWALT DC825B 1/4-Inch 18-Volt Cordless Impact Driver (Tool Only, No Battery)
I bought this last year after my Black and Decker 18v drill died it's 3rd death. I got it in a 4 tool combo kit on sale at Lowes. I build haunted houses for the Halloween season so most of what I do construction wise is with rough and sometimes very old and hard woods. The woods are also made super tough (like rock) from a chemical that must be sprayed on them to make them fire retardant. I found that before, even with an 18v drill that screws would shear off before going into the boards which made it difficult to make secure connections in the wood. It is hard to make something look old and spooky and still have it be safe so having good, solid tools is a must. Right after I charged the battery I tried this tool out. Wow!! It drove a 3 inch deck screw into an old hardened 2x4 in the blink of an eye!! I had never used a tool like that. It quickly became a favorite of mine on the jobsite. I used it hard and it never once let me down. I bought it toward the end of the build so I only got to use it on a few hundred screws but never a disappointment. I'm looking forward to using on this season's build as well as in my volunteer work with Habitat for Humanity. I would highly recommend this tool to anyone who builds.
I bought this tool to add to my dewalt collection. I have had the 18volt dill for years and did'nt think that I need an impact driver. I was wrong. I am using the impact more that the drill for driving large screws. It make the jobs much easier. The driver was shipped by a third party and I received it in just a few days. I was very impressed. This is an excellent tool if you do lots of repair work with 2 by lumber.
I have long been a loyal DeWalt costumer, especially when in comes to cordless tools like the 18v drill I purchased 6 years ago. That drill quickly became my favorite tool and has seen constant use since. In fact I was so happy with the drill that I did not see any reason to buy an impact driver, until a couple of projects I was working on required me to drive a large number of constuction screws and lag bolts. My drill was able to drive them but not as easily or quickly as I would have liked, so I decided it was time to give the impact driver a try and my only regret it that I did not buy one sooner. This driver is by far the best power tool I have ever owned. It is absolutely necessary for driving lag screws or anything comparable but also preforms so much better in less demanding tasks like running deck screws. I have discovered that it is also quite handy for boring large holes even though that is not the intent behind the tool. If you put an Irwin Speedbore bit in this thing it will chew through 4 by lumber in no time. Using the driver for boring has saved my wrist on a number of occasions as those Speedbore bits require quite abit of torque to run and if the bit binds up while using a regular drill all that torque gets transferred to your wrist. Now that I have a set of Irwin Speedbore and Spade bits plus a decent hex drill bit set my drill is relegated to drilling metal and the occasional pilot hole.
This driver is also much better at removing rusty and stripped screws than my drill, just another unexpected bonus.
Without exception this is the one tool that goes with me to every job. - Dewalt - 18 Volt - Impact Drivers - Cordless'
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