[Advice Needed on what to replace my lost power tools with]

7 hours ago, Stercorarius said:

Yeah that's because Milwaukee has one of the best warranties in the industry. If it's sent in and done by them it doesn't void the warranty. Sounds like they were all new tools and should be under warranty. We've sent Milwaukee tool in for stuff as small as a loose direction selector switch or a touchy trigger and the ones they couldn't fix they sent back with an upgraded model for free. It isn't costing you anything so I don't see the reason for the hate. Really you think some tools from Europe are going to be easier and cheaper to service? In one block I can go get stuff for a Milwaukee or DeWalt tool at four or five separate places. You know how many places will sell you a blade for a Metabo porta-band? Zero. You have to order them online or have them made and welded for you which takes a while as no one does it in house. Would you expect Ford to just send you a bunch of engine parts for a new F150 that's under warranty? No because even if you know your shit the majority of the world doesn't know dick and so for them to continue to honor the warranty it has to be done by someone who is certified. That's the same across the board with every automobile manufacturer anywhere. Why would your drill be any different?

 

I'm not saying they aren't after your money. Just about each and every corporation would do anything to get another dime out of you because that's what they're supposed to do, but they do it more strategically. Apple doesn't let you repair their devices, John Deere doesn't let you modify their software, and the list goes on and on because companies can't honor warranties when some jackhoff did who knows what to it already and they can't have us regular jackhoffs doing work on them because it is too interlinked with their reputation. If they have dozens of drills breaking on the job site because people screwed up their repairs they'll lose customers and potential customers because all they are seeing is broken drills. If they have handfuls of broken drills because of shotty QC in China but guys see that they are quickly warrantied for no cost it won't hurt them as much. 

 

You think TE won't sell a copalum crimper because they have a hard on for money and will only rent it out to certified users because they are money hungry? No they could very well make more money selling the crimpers, but because they only let certified technicians handle it, copalum crimps are the ONLY way to do a pigtail fix on aluminum wiring currently on the market that hasn't resulted in a house fire. They aren't about to let an asshole like me or any homeowner who watches too many YouTube videos go out and start doing a shit job and getting their houses burned down because then people will start to think that the product fails and not the installer.

 

I'm not saying you don't know how to fix your tools. I'm sure you can with no problems. I'm just saying a lot of people can't. For what it's worth I also think Milwaukee chucks are shit. It's not like fein is any less American than Milwaukee. It's all made in the same place so I really couldn't care less about which tools you prefer. Just feel like going on a solid rant every now and then.

 

Milwaukee does have a good warranty. Never disputed that.

 

Why are you going to have someone listed on your website as a certified repair center, recommend them to your customers to take their faulty products to, and PAY those people to do your warranty service for you if they can't do the job correctly?

 

Take a 2704 to the same shop, or any non-one-key tool, and they'll fix it for you without a problem.

 

You know what the difference between a 2704 and a 2706 is? I've had both of them apart. A bluetooth transmitter, a button cell battery, and a couple extra bits on the circuit board (which is completely potted, so no one is repairing that, not even Milwaukee themselves).

 

The guy who can repair the 2704 with one hand while snoggin' on his donut and coffee with the other can't repair a 2706, but this shmuck behind this keyboard can?

 

Come on....

 

Milwaukee's warranty is fine. The problem is that you have to use the warranty on a regular basis to get a tool that works like it should have out of the box until the day you wear it out.

 

Why am I going to buy tools that I constantly have to turn in under warranty? I own a couple Metabo tools. I own a Hilti SDS. I've owned several more over-the-pond tools over the years. No complaints about Makita either. I own Bosch's  5.5 amp contractor grade oscillating tool. I've used that poor bastard to probe the darkest depths of Satan's back-end and stomped on it with all of my weight to get it there for over a year and it runs like new. Reliable. That's a word. Remember that word?

 

Not a single issue with any of them until I was ready to replace them just due to general wear and tear. No finicky BS, no quirks, no electrical tape to keep that twitchy bit from shaking loose. Nothing.

 

I want my tool to work from the moment I pick it up in my hand to the moment I set it down, and I don't want to think about it in between those periods. People seem to have forgotten that this is not only possible, but it is what we call a "Good Product" which is what I set out to buy every time I open my wallet, and is what every consumer should expect when they buy anything.

 

You're a hop and a skip away from several parts stores. Great. You know what happens when I hop and skip out to find something to fix my tools that're supposed to be doing the fixing? I fall face-first in the damn swamp. There's nothing out here. I only need one place to get everything I need and that's in front of my computer monitor though. I get it cheap, I get it delivered in 2-3 days (Even Metabo parts), and I keep backups. I don't run out of porta-band blades, because not having a blade handy costs me exponentially more than ordering another 6-pack when I get down to a dozen or so.

 

Working off of the cuff of your sleeve with your materials and tools may work for you but it's too expensive for my tastes, and even if I were in the middle of a large city where I could walk down the block and get anything I need I'd still operate the way I do because I don't get paid to leave the jobsite for an hour to grab another drill, and in my personal time I'm not going make a trip down to the corner and come back to a warm beer.

 

Forget the fact that I like to keep all of those pennies to spend them on more tools that don't fall to pieces when I walk in the room at the mere thought of work. I just don't want the friggin' hassle.

 

 

[More on saw stop]

6 hours ago, Grumpy MSG said:

The massive hole in your argument is that Bosch did exactly that, created a safety device equal to or better than the SawStop with 2 shots to a cartridge and doesn't lock up and ruin a blade. SawStop sued and instead of a license settlement/agreement went for the cease and desist order. So now if you purchased one of the Bosch jobsite table saws (SawStop did not even offer a comparable model at the time), you cannot purchase replacement cartridges. That is why a lot of folks think they had a great idea, but don't agree with the Company's policy and therefore won't do business with them. 

That's called protecting your patent. Bosch's design wasn't dissimilar enough to keep it from infringing on the patent.

 

I don't care who you are, if you have a patent, you better sic your lawyer on anyone who puts one toe over the line in your protected intellectual property, otherwise when your patent goes up for review or renewal, you lose it.

 

That's how it works, and if you don't like it, go hire a team of lawyers and spend the rest of your life trying to get patent laws changed.

 

You still think it's a dick move? What would you have done? We all dream of having that Eureka moment and coming up with a brilliant idea, turning around and patenting it, then riding that patent to an early and comfortable retirement from the confines of our own garages.

 

What would you do if you were on the easy side of that slope and someone snicked your idea, reverse engineered it real quick, and put it on the market in direct competition with you?

 

If you didn't sue them, you'd be back to square one, letting the cogs and wheels turn again hoping lightning will strike twice while you fix the leg on your dining room chair a few years later, because the larger company (Bosch) came out of left field and steamrolled you with their marketing, production, customer support and entire teams of engineers devoted to product development, barely noticing the bump in the road (Sawstop) as they grind ever onward to that annual 4% GPR.

 

Everybody loves to act like they're behind the underdog, until the underdog wins, and then he's just as evil as the despot he de-throned.

 

[More on saw stop]

Meh. I'm buying a 3hp Sawstop next month.

 

There's a lot of talk about creating a monopoly but that's not what the guy is doing. Any company can step up to the plate and create a safety device equal to the sawstop and compete with them. None of them have. Personally that just seems lazy, because this guy has already proven that there's a huge market for the stuff. Sawstop is the top seller in the U.S., and it isn't just because they make great table saws

 

Accidents happen, and they're often stupid accidents. I'm not fond of my own stupidity costing me flesh and appendages. I try to idiot-proof my work as much as possible, and a Sawstop saw makes that really easy which appeals to my second strongest motivation - laziness.

 

Thirdly, Sawstop knows how to appeal to my miserly habits and make me feel like I'm saving money. I'm going to end up getting my little hobby shop LLC'd and insured, because if I'm going to be out banging off in the toolshed every other night I'm probably going to be making too much money to hide from the Tax-man. When the assessor comes out to look at my shop I will be pulling him off to the side to have a moment about my new table saw, and show him the famous hot-dog video, and drop a hint that I've already had another insurance company tell me that they offer deep discounts for people who put safety equipment on their more dangerous tools.

 

I get to avoid potentially embarrassing myself with a stupid injury and stick it to the man, without sacrificing the quality of my work? I'm in.

[Advice Needed on what to replace my lost power tools with]

7 hours ago, AnonymousJoe said:

So they won't sell u a chuck for the 2706? That's weird. My 2704 does have the larger hole chuck I know that much. I don't understand why they can't just admit it's the same drill and sell u parts.  Did u look at other online part stores?

 

They won't sell you or any retailer anything for the One-Key tools. "No user serviceable parts. All maintenance has to be done by a factory certified technician."

 

And it gets even better. Not all factory certified technicians are allowed to work on One-Key tools. I sent my first 2706 to a local shop I found through Milwaukee's website for the warranty work, figured I'd help their personal economy a little. After it sat on their shelf for a week because they were busy they called me up and said "Sorry about this, but according to Milwaukee we're not allowed to do warranty service repairs on this model of tool. We're going to have to send it in to the factory to get it fixed."

 

So it seems like even authorized repair shops aren't allowed to buy parts for them. You can't even get around their shenanigans by chatting up the guy at the local shop and asking for a favor now and then.

 

Just about every tool in the world is listed on Amazon, (by the way, buy your Milwaukee tools from Amazon and Milwaukee won't honor the warranty) Hilti, Metabo, Bosch's european line of tools, Fein, etc... are all just as easy to buy now as Black and Decker. I see no compelling reason to keep bending over for corporations that aren't content with just all of the moneys, but also want you to abandon your sense of reason in the name of brand loyalty and maybe take out a second mortgage too.

[Advice Needed on what to replace my lost power tools with]

12 minutes ago, AnonymousJoe said:

I've been thru similar frustrations with Milwaukee but u can buy replacement chucks online. With dewalt tho there's no screw in the chuck, it's some sort of pin and I'm not sure how or if it's even possible to remove.

ive also noticed that milwaukee chucks just seem real finicky. I can put a drill bit in and it'll wobble, then I'll slightly loosen and re tighten and it runs true. I think it's just how the teeth bite. 

I had a 2611 and the chuck worked great after one good smack with a 2 lb hammer to loosen up one side of it. I know the finicky side of Milwaukee's tools.

 

There's nothing you can do about a chuck with a 14mm shaft though, because there is only one chuck with a 14mm shaft in existence. Milwaukee makes it, and it's one of the worst chucks I've ever used by default. It's not even a matter of playing the lottery until you get a good one, they're all defective.

 

I'd buy a replacement chuck from Milwaukee to see if it somehow gets damaged during assembly, but they won't sell it to me. You can only buy a replacement chuck for the 2704 and hope it's the same shaft, because no one lists the specs on it.

 

I'm done throwing more money after money poorly spent though. The drill will be used until I get sick of wobbled out holes, and then it'll be replaced, and not a single tear will be shed.

 

Quote

Or you can just 1) get warranty service since even the oldest ones are 1 1/2 old out of a 3 year warranty or 2) over the counter exchange at many retailers. 

 

Another good point. I'm tired of buying tools that I replace more often than my cellphone. Having a warranty doesn't do me any good when I'm 2 hours from nowhere and the tool craps out 2 hours into a 12 hour work day.

[Advice Needed on what to replace my lost power tools with]

Going to loudly recommend you stay away from Milwaukee and Dewalt both.

 

Just bought a bunch of Milwaukee tools myself, including the One-Key hammer drill and impact. Nothing but disappointments. Both the drill and impact have bad chuck wobble. Tolerable on the impact, but absolutely unacceptable on the drill, which I've replaced twice, and all three chucks had wobble that was bad enough to break even 3/8" bits if you're running into harder materials.

 

Judging from other people's reports, and the date codes on the tools, every 2706 One-Key drill that's been manufactured in the last couple months of 2016 and first half of 2017 has the same defects in the chuck. It's just garbage.

 

So alright. I'm not helpless. I know how to change a drill chuck. I picked up a nice Rohm chuck and was all excited to upgrade my tool. But I can't. The shaft on the 2706 isn't the industry standard 1/2-20, it's a 14mm, just to screw with you. There's no reason to make it a 14mm shaft other than to make sure the user can't service their own tool.

 

You can't buy replacement parts at all for the 2706, 2757 or any of the One-Key tools. Their top of the line products are also the least durable, in this sense, because any tool that you can replace parts on will last longer. The people who're paying the most are getting the least for their money.

 

Dewalt is barely any better when it comes to replacement parts. Parts for their top of the line tools typically can only be purchased directly from them, and the price is hyper-inflated. Trigger burn out on your DCD996? Sorry, can't just replace the trigger, you've got to buy the entire electronic assembly for $145 and oh... It so happens that you can buy the tool itself for $140... Less during a sale...

 

But what really gets me about Dewalt is their penchant for treating consumers like they're idiots with their marketing. Competition has 18v batteries? WE'VE got 20! (All 18v lithium batteries are 20v max) Competition has 1000 in. lbs of torque and we've only got 950? We just won't publish that spec, ever. Competition has 1800 in lbs of torque and we've got 1825? We're not going to shut up about that 1.3% advantage. Ever. You know what's better than 20v? SIXTY.

 

Nothing but marketing spooge. Volts only very slightly increase the efficiency of an electric motor until you get into the 100+ range. Amperage is what gives you power and run-time. You only hear a peep here and there about their $160 9.0Ah battery though. 60 is bigger than 9.0, 20 and 18, and moar numbers is moar better, so we've got to print that as large as possible all over the box.

 

You only get to treat me like I'm an idiot once.

 

You only get to dip into my wallet like it's your personal piggy bank once.

 

Dewalt will be switching battery platforms again shortly after their switch to 60v in their undying pursuit for moar numbers for moar better. I don't intend to be sitting on half a dozen of them when that happens.

 

I'm going to be sticking with german/european manufacturers from now on with a smattering of Makita. Makita's angle grinders are a close second to Metabo for half the price and they make a very respectable hypoid circular saw. Everything else I'm getting from across the Atlantic.

 

I've had enough.

 

I may spend twice as much, but at least I'll be satisfied and won't feel like I sat on the narrow end of a long flagpole 3 months after my purchase.