Drill recommendations

Nocky24

Nocky24

Nocky24

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Joined
19 May 2009
Posts
3,113
Location
Cannock
My old hammer drill I was given a few years ago has blown and I'm in need of a new one. I'm a noob and honestly do very little DIY so I'm in need of some buying advice. The immediate need currently is to hang up a 6kg mirror on a masonry wall.

I've always wanted to get a driver (haven't got one) or a combi drill, but I'm not sure how good some of those combi hammer/drivers are around the £60 mark (budget by the way). I was looking at something like this:

http://www.diy.com/departments/black-decker-cordless-18v-li-ion-drill-1-battery-bdh18k/808918_BQ.prd

Whatever I buy, it'll only be used for very occasional simple wall fixings here and there over the course of it's use.

Any help or advice will be much appreciated, cheers
 
Has a very slow charge time and the battery capacity is quite low at 1.5ah. It should be fine if just used for the odd hole though. If you ever wanted to do a more adventurous project like decking, it would be a pita.

Worth looking at Ryobi and green Bosch in this price range as well. - Edit - scrap that, they are more like £80, so a bit out of budget.
 
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hammer action tends to drain the battery more. 1.5ah you may find it needs charging a lot - does it have a second battery in the pack?
 
a word of warning, IME cordless drill/drivers are useless when it comes to anything heavy duty drilling wise.

I love my makita corless drill it is bar none the most used and favourite tool ever bought.
But if I need to drill masonry I don't even bother with it i just reach for a proper drill.
It will drill into breeze blocks ok however.

I recently bought an SDS drill, which for what use it gets was probably a waste of money but it rips through masonry. :)
 
Nocky24 said:
Cheers all, I've been looking into this further and I'm liking the look of this one more now and it comes with two battery packs (£22 more than budget, but still..):

http://www.diy.com/departments/bosc...number-of-drill-speeds-psb-1800/849504_BQ.prd

User reviews seems pretty solid wherever I look.
Click to expand...

I was all set on one of the Makita sets and ended up coming away with the Bosch. Now I don't do much but anything I have done it's been fine, along with some Bosch TCT bits.
 
The Bosch you've linked to is the later version of mine.

The only flaw with the Bosch is that the rotation break (i.e. you release the trigger and the drill stops the chuck rotating) is immediate and so the drill will actually undo the chuck over a couple of stops if the chuck isn't twisted tight enough.

I've had mine since ~2011 and it's still going well.
 
MassiveJim said:
a word of warning, IME cordless drill/drivers are useless when it comes to anything heavy duty drilling wise.

I love my makita corless drill it is bar none the most used and favourite tool ever bought.
But if I need to drill masonry I don't even bother with it i just reach for a proper drill.
It will drill into breeze blocks ok however.

I recently bought an SDS drill, which for what use it gets was probably a waste of money but it rips through masonry. :)
Click to expand...

Got to agree with this. My cordless is fine for small jobs but I invested in this SDS corded drill and it just goes through masonry like a hot knife through butter:

http://www.screwfix.com/p/titan-ttb279sds-5kg-sds-plus-drill-240v/55660

Huge beast and I'd think twice before using it up a ladder but the two drill strategy is making DIY a whole lot easier. It's also opened my eyes to chisel drill bits that are great for breaking up tiles, paving slabs etc.
 
Thanks for all your responses, really appreciate it :) In the end I went for the Makita at £98:

http://www.diy.com/departments/maki...bi-drill-2-batteries-hp457dwex2/278413_BQ.prd

Also threw in a new set of Bosch 34 piece drill/driver bits.

Had a go with it tonight and I have to say I'm really impressed. Solid build quality and powerful enough for the odd jobs I'd be doing. Plus having two battery packs will come in useful I'm sure.

Thanks again all :)
 
BigT said:
Got to agree with this. My cordless is fine for small jobs but I invested in this SDS corded drill and it just goes through masonry like a hot knife through butter:

http://www.screwfix.com/p/titan-ttb279sds-5kg-sds-plus-drill-240v/55660

Huge beast and I'd think twice before using it up a ladder but the two drill strategy is making DIY a whole lot easier. It's also opened my eyes to chisel drill bits that are great for breaking up tiles, paving slabs etc.
Click to expand...

That's why I 'only' went for the 2Kg class 850W 3.2J.. that's enough to handle for most things.

@nocky - the great thing about those is doing a solid 30 minutes of putting screws in and you don't end up with a wrist that's feeling the burn!
 
Nocky24 said:
Thanks for all your responses, really appreciate it :) In the end I went for the Makita at £98:
Click to expand...

Like.

Mine has been brilliant but later on if you can afford get yourself a nice solid SDS drill with attachments for chiseling.
I got a Kress about 20 years ago and it cost about £250 but it's been worth it's weight in gold over the years.
 
I think I paid about £100 for my Bosch SDS, I didn't go for a massive one for 2 reasons.
I generally don't do heavy work and the extra weight would have made it a pain to use
It was bought to replace a percussion drill with a knackered chuck.
So it was a toss up between an SDS or another percussion, I went for the SDS with the logic that I had my cordless already and between the 2 drills I should be able to handle most jobs.

The SDS has been usefull when I needed to remove some concrete in fence posts as it can be set to "non-rotation" mode for things like that.

And as said above it generally drills through masonry much better than the percussion drill I have with a broken chuck)

The only downside was that I had to also buy a new set of drill bits to fit it.
 
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