Anybody else who uses ALDI Ferrex tools?

SexyGreyFox

SexyGreyFox

SexyGreyFox

Man of Honour
Joined
29 Mar 2003
Posts
57,136
Location
Stoke on Trent
At the start of the year we needed a new lawn mower and saw a cordless Ferrex one in ALDI so bought it with a charger and battery. We were that impressed I drove back to ALDI and bought the hedge trimmers that use the same battery. Not as good as my Pro Bosch electric ones but not far off.
A couple of weeks later there appeared a power drill, impact driver and angle grinder so I bought them plus another spare battery and charger.
Over the last 8 months I stored my expensive tools away and used only these tools on many jobs - I have 4 houses to look after and I can honestly say they feel just as good as my Makita's etc so I think these tools are made by a big company who put the Ferrex name on them.
This morning I've bought an SDS Rotary Hammer drill with an addon normal twist chuck for £30. I got it home and it's brilliant, obviously not as good as my Kress I bought for nearly £300 in 1990 but good enough for small jobs around the house.
I've also bought a few more Ferrex bits & pieces plus the Workzone bag for £16.99 this morning.

I know a few of you will be smirking but from someone who has done a lot of DIY since 1980 I'm very impressed.

ferrex.jpg
 
robj20 said:
What puts me off is the lack of permanent availablity. You have to wait for them to have them in and know telling when they'll have what you want.
I decided a while ago to stick to Dewalt.
Click to expand...

That is the problem and also the reason why I bought two batteries and two chargers.
If anything fails then I have name backups until it can be replaced but they do seem like they are made by a named company.
Working at Creda we put the names of Hotpoint, Belling, Ariston, Indesit on our products.
When I bought my Kress drill in 1990 I was told that Kress made Makita but sold their own brand cheaper.
 
robj20 said:
Not just the batteries, actual tools, for instance the other day I wanted to add a circular saw to my collection. You couldn't just go and get a Ferrex one, where you can with the big brands.
Shame really as for DIY they're plenty good enough I'd imagine.
Click to expand...

They have got the cordless Ferrex circular saws at our ALDI but the last few wood cutting jobs have been done with my angle grinder with wood cutting disc so I haven't bothered.
I also have a wired Bosch Professional just in case.

I can see me just getting one now :)
They also have a cordless polisher but I can't think of one job for that.
 
dLockers said:
"Kevin Iomas - Head of Product at Walter"
Click to expand...

Just been on the site, I can't believe that ALDI sell them for half the price than Walter sell them for.

eg I took my Ferrex drill into work today which cost £20 from ALDI, if I bought nothing else in the Ferrex range the charger would be £15 and the 20v battery would be £15 so a total of £50.
Walter are selling the same one for £86 https://www.walteronline.com/en/too...w-drivers/20-v-cordless-impact-drill-p7150134
 
Werewolf said:
Now they're using standardised battery packs they're even better as previously it seemed every time they got a battery tool in it used either a different shape, size or voltage of battery so you ended up with half a dozen different completely incompatable sets of tools/batteries/chargers.
Click to expand...

because of the amount of Ferrex tools we now have (8) we have bought 2x chargers, 2x 40v & 2x 20v batteries.

Werewolf said:
These days I tend to buy decent quality drill and screwdriver bits because I've found they can make at least as much of a difference in the average job as the power tool,
Click to expand...

Spot on.
I took the Ferrex cordless hammer drill to work yesterday to do some jobs in the office that would take the Trust Estates 2 months to do.
Using quality SDS masonry bits the jobs were done in minutes.
I've even bought the special impact driver bits.
 
lewism said:
Take the DeWalt multi Tool Vs the Ferrex one. The Ferrex one is a quarter of the price but lasted me literally three months. My Dewalts been going for four years of daily abuse. I wanted to like the Ferrex stuff and bought it all to try. And I think it's pants. My Ferrex jigsaw didn't cut straight out the box.
Click to expand...

However the company that make Ferrex are way dearer with their own name on - https://www.walteronline.com/en/too...w-drivers/20-v-cordless-impact-drill-p7150134
 
lewism said:
At the end of the day, a hole in the wall will take a fixing no matter what drill made it. I'm just trying to offer some perspective because people get bowled over by the cheapness of the tool. Whereas if you spend just a bit more money you'll get a longer life out of the tool and thus more value for money and a more enjoyable experience.
Click to expand...

I think I said in my post I already have named tools that I have now stored in the attic to bring down if these Ferrex fall apart and so far so good.
The only one I have kept downstairs is my proper Kress electric hammer drill that cost nearly £300 in the late 80s.
 
Tom_ed1987 said:
They are far better than all the generic cheap off-brand tools you get from Argos/B&Q/Amazon etc. I'd say the quality is far closer to the big brands than it is the cheap stuff. It looks to me like they basically copy the Bosch product range.
Click to expand...

Last year I think CH4 did a programme on ALDI/LIDL products and they came out very favourably against the bigger brands.
ALDI have now released a Ferrex Pro range which I tempted to get.

Back in the 80s I went to a specialist shop to buy a name brand hammer drill and took over £400 with me.
I knew the bloke in the shop and he pointed at a KRESS hammer drill and said "Buy that".
I said I wanted a name product that would last and he said that Kress made Makita amongst others but they sell the same products for half price with their own name on.
It's still going strong.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom