Stay away from the Kawasaki 21.6 volt drill

[Ray Moser]

About a year and a half ago Sam's Club had the drill for about $45. It came with a nice case and a lot of accessories. Four or 5 months ago I got a notice from Sam's Club that there was a recall and a website that one could visit. Mine was part of the recall. It seems that the really nice automatic 1 hour charger was the wrong one and it could cause the batteries to explode, melt or catch fire. Within about a month, I got the replacement charger. Instead of having an automatic shut off, you had to manually keep track of the charging time. Included was a letter from the president of Alltrade Tools stating how they wanted to insure service, quality, etc. I wrote a letter stating that I didn't think a cheap replacement charger showed much of a commitment to quality. Next thing I know, I get a phone call from the gentleman offering me a full refund of the purchase price and I accepted the offer. A few days ago, while driving screws into drywall inserts, the clutch broke. The drill has never been used for any thing but light duty and certainly not abused. OK, I got a free year and a half use and a few drill bits, screwdrive bits, etc. But the hassle really hasn't been worth the freebies. My next drill will be DeWalt, Milwaukee or something of similar nature. What is that saying about the happiness over a bargin is soon overcome by the grief of a failure of cheap product.

[Rich Konopka]

Ray,

Not to rub it in but you get what you pay for. I personally would recommend a Makita, Panasonic, or Festool over the Dewalt. I have two Dewalts and they are ok but have had issues with the gears slipping.

[Cody Colston]

"The bitterness of poor quality lingers long after the sweetness of price is forgotten"...sign seen at my local John Deere dealership.

[John Sanford]

I've also had two DeWalts, their major problem has been a disconcerting ability to disappear. :eek: You'd think with them being bright yellow that they wouldn't be able to hide so well, but still... One was glommed by varmints, the other managed to grow legs and walk off.

I had no complaints with either one, although the current crop of DeWalts is physically longer than I'd like.

Go with a quality cordless drill/driver, i.e. Bosch, DeWalt, Festool, Hilti, Makita, Milwaukee, Panasonic. Rigid and Hitachi are the next step down, then you get to Ryobi, B&D, Skil, Craftsman. Below that, yes, there are lots below, are the junkers you'll find at Harbor Freight, Big Lots, auto parts stores, etc. Usually they have a recognizable brand (such as Kawasaki, Coleman, etc), but they're barely better than "tool shaped objects."

(Metabo is a mystery to me, they don't distribute them in these parts.)

[Robert Mayer]

Kawasaki is a brand I look to for power tools. That disappointing...

:D

[Bill Wyko]

There's an old saying. "The bitterness of poor quality lingers long after the cheap price is forgotten." I have found this to exceptionally true with screw guns. I haven't had much luck with the DeWalt screw guns and their batteries are WAY too expensive. I did buy a 14V LI small B&D and it takes quite a beating and I never take it off the charger. It actually sits on the charger when not in use w/o taking the battery off. This lil sucker is a power house. It was 89.99 at HD.

[Matt Meiser]

Don't assume a better one is going be safer. A guy in our club had a major house fire which was traced back to his name-brand battery/charger. The insurance investigator said he'd seen it before several times. And I had a DeWalt battery get very hot and start smoking heavily while in use (and not heavy use.) I threw it out in the snow and it was still hot 15 minutes later. I believe something in the impact driver shorted to cause that. Its still advisable not to leave batteries charging unattended.

[Dave Lehnert]

Dewalt had a recall some time ago,

http://www.dewalt.com/us/articles/press_release.asp?ID=230

[Steve Nouis]

Just another case of the so called mangement put what was a good name on junk. Steve