When it comes to corded gas or air tools it doesn't really matter if you mix up a lot of
different brands but what about when you're buying into a cordless system let's talk about it i'm
kenny koehler managing editor of pro tool reviews and i'm here with clint deboer editor-in-chief
of pro tour reviews and tom gage our resident contractor today guys we're talking about how do
we choose a cordless battery platform to buy into so let's assume for a second that you're going to
set up a little consulting booth at your local hardware store and you're going to advise people
and help them understand what things they need to consider when they buy into a cordless tool system
where do you start i think we got to ask some questions i need to know who they are what
they're doing the right questions that that'll tell you exactly what they need okay well let's
start off with your typical residential contractor i'm gonna throw this one to you okay well i'd ask
is he running a crew or is he you know what how is he using the tools or what type of
tools is he mostly looking for okay so how does this crew come into play in that conversation
to me if you're supplying tools for your guys you're going to take into consideration costs
i think okay and so that that's a big part of it um now if it's just a you know father-son
doing of different types of things then it might bring in a different type of tool um but i think
value is a a cost is a big upfront cost okay and that's really for everybody right whether you're
diy or high-end pro or somewhere in the middle you've got a budget right you do but having a
budget for your own tools in a limited sense and having budget for like a fleet of people or you're
running a tool crib or you're sending you know so just depends on how the company is structured but
at the basic level a contractor has to build his system around a core group of tools that he can
rely on that are going to be solid they're going to be you know those core two and what we define
as core tools is going to be what circ saw impact driver drill reciprocating saw those four tools
are probably your core tools and then everything else from that's really great to have yeah we kind
of call that the general contractor's kit those four tools in particular and then oscillating
multi-tool can be thrown in there you've got some other general tools there's a lot of people that
deli people use and all that kind of stuff so all right so you it's got to get the job done it's
got to fit your budget what else golly i mean i think warranty matters okay i think that you know
you need to know you're gonna have some longevity so their ability to tools
durability is a big deal because when you're out on a project you don't want something not working
breaking down you need it to work and so longevity and durability is i think a really big part of it
yeah and you had said like general contractors so you're talking like kind of a home builder or
yeah i mean from it's there's such a difference between framing a house or doing flooring or
you know just kind of all around reno you know remodeling renovation stuff carpentry work
so really depending on which of those fields or which of those focuses or if you do them all
it's going to widen that that sense of of what you want to make sure you have access to on a platform
so if i'm deciding on a cordless platform i'm really going to look at not only what i do but the
scope of what i do and that's going to determine somewhat of a trajectory because there's a lot of
really great tool brands out there who make some solid core tools and they're maybe not as as deep
or as wide you bring up a great example you know trade specific tool you know electricians plumbers
they've got different tools than a general contractor and using the frameworks all that other
kind of stuff so everybody kind of used those four cool core tools somewhere along the way and then
you said you branch out into a lot of other stuff excuse me so beyond just the basics of getting the
job done hitting your budget and surviving your job site now you really want to look i'm buying
these tools today but i need to expand into these others later and so the brand that you're buying
into really needs to have those products available to you it does matter and and and that's where
again we started with that general contractor or a contractor or a pro who's in some field or some
area of special you know specialty or he's running a crew that does all sorts of stuff and remodeling
he's got to have access to those tools he can buy into multiple platforms but it sure makes
it a lot easier when you can it's a lot nicer to have a charging station with one type of battery
that fits everybody nobody's confused nobody has to worry about it you know you keep buying in
and you're cycling out and yeah it makes the world a whole lot easier so let me throw a hypothetical
at you i'm gonna throw this at you tom all right so let's say i you know milwaukee is
really well known for their wide breadth of tools and and hitting the electrician and the plumbers
in particular really really well so let's say that you're on a cordless platform that's not milwaukee
you're a plumber and now you really need that pex expander so you go buy milwaukee's are you okay
having a few milwaukee tools over here and keeping the rest of your stuff or are you
going to start to just transition over to milwaukee so i've actually done that okay um
true stories i had rigid for a long time and over a period of time i got one tool from makita
i liked it and then i got opportunity to get another tool because i found it on sale
and over time my my tool collection went from ridgid to makita okay and it's difficult to
have two different brands of tools because then it's oh did i forget to charge this battery for
this brand and then did i forget to you know it's always you're always chasing your tail i felt like
and now that i've completely switched over to one brand again my battery bank is always one type of
battery that fits all my tools i don't have to be looking around for the battery that fits this tool
it makes it a lot easier to if i have to go do a punch list to grab a bag throw what i need into it
and not have to worry about mixing and matching um so i think at a professional level one platform
makes it a lot easier yeah and on on your to you on directly to your issue of like a pex
expander or something that you're you know grab a a particular milwaukee tool because they make it
it is it's not a big deal to keep all that you know keep that kit in a bag right and that's
your that's your pex expansion tool but what often happens is you see that you know some season comes
around you see that bare tool deal you know we're all we're all tool guys i mean we just go and you
go to buy one more tool but and the next thing you know you start kind of it's it's a kind of
introduces you to a whole new world of things that you may not and not even within the world of like
plumbing or the world of of electrical you just have all of a sudden you your eyes open to what's
available out there from that brand and you start to see more and more things i start with an m12
pex expander i'm doing an awful lot of it and now i'm starting to do bigger you know diameter pipes
and oh my goodness they have an m18 that'll handle larger pecs and i'm going to grab that and so that
kind of stuff happens and you just kind of go down the rabbit hole so what about what about the diy
we're talking professional level is it as big of a deal for a wire to manage multiple batteries
i think it's worse i don't know i mean it's almost easier if you have a three or four charger sitting
on your bench in your garage and you got one drill that's this and one drill that's that
i hate that though i just need it yeah it's not difficult because i'm not working out of a truck
no no that's true it drops having to find five different plugs to plug in five different chargers
it's a lot easier when it's on your garage yes yeah to mix and match and get the latest deal
at the same time it's not efficient by any means it's not efficient it's really nice
to be able to get on a platform and and so you know it's funny the same thing can happen you go
just like what you went through you can be you can start on a really entry-level platform and
then realize you get to a point where you're you're doing projects that just may exceed a
little bit of the capabilities of some of those tools and now you again you drift into a ridgid
and now you're on ridgid you know you were on something else so those those kind of things
can go they won't go down but they'll always feed up but they can happen the diy level the pro level
yeah and i mean the fun thing about about having multiple batteries in your garage right
is no matter who's on sale for water they come out with a really cool product it's like you
can get it i've already got battery for that let me grab that bear tool that's a good point and
that's that is a unique perspective well that's my garage i'll be perfectly that's my garage too yeah
i currently have three brands in my garage right now yeah i think i'm rocking four yeah and it does
help it does help you get some more options so all right so let me let me throw a monkey
wrench at your comp about your comment about pros sticking to one battery platform let's let's pick
well you know let's pick on uh let's let's pick on makita all right great huge range of 18 volt tools
and thanks to 18 volt x2 36 volt tools but i know all three of us carry both 18 volt and 12 volt
tools and we don't complain one bit about carrying two different batteries so why is it okay to do
multiple battery voltages but you don't want to manage different brands or did i just completely
blow this conversation up no for me they use the same charger okay so that to me is i'm not
again sometimes when you're jocking for space and plugs on a job site there's not a lot of space to
be able to plug in a lot of chargers and so when you have a charger that can handle two or three
four platforms you know of that brand it simplifies it so i don't mind having a smaller
compact tool with a smaller battery as long as i can use the same charger as my other one too
and some of the brands have done it better than others you know you've got dewalt
same charger will do 12 and 20 you've got uh milwaukee you'll do them side by side
but every charger they send with a tool now has both you know so you have these these brands out
there that'll that are good at doing that and it does it makes it a whole lot easier now i can
have the ergonomics of the smaller tool which really does 80 of what i need it in most cases
and i don't have to really it's a new battery platform but i'm not running somewhere trying
to find a charger or anything like that so you do have to have a little bit of extra space for two
different types of batteries but at least your chargers are managed and tom has a great point
about jockeying for for cord space and i get those 12-volt smaller tools because they're more compact
i mean i've got a very specific reason for wanting to go to a lower size tool
and it just saves me a lot of hassles and that brings up a great point right because even after
you've got the platform that you need is doing the doing the work it's got the durability it's
hitting your budget you still have to actually like the way the tool feels in your hand yeah
sure always yeah so ergonomics come into to play hugely but it's not just really it's not just
the handle what else what all is going into the ergonomics there weight the way the trigger feels
i mean the controls where they're located for the left you know forward reversing buttons
there's lots of parts and pieces i'll i'll touch on the tool to chuck how the chucks work
that's a big one for me balance always changes on like a multi-tool even you know hanging an 18
off the back versus a 12. everything it all plays together into how a tool feels and so
if you're running around a house doing baseboard you know or undercutting doors for tile jobs or
whatever you're doing you know having a multi-tool handy that's really lightweight even just how they
fit in a tool bag you know sometimes it's a lot easier with a 12 volt than you know you just
what you can carry with you in that weight well and outside even the cordless systems you know
whether it's hand tools or cordless recorder you know you take stuff like the kaizen custom inserts
it's like when everything has a place and it goes all together right man it's just that makes your
day better that's it yeah that's pretty cool so let's shift gears a little bit what about
ope so we've got a lot of battery-powered lawn care equipment that's out there now
and most of it's running on higher voltage systems than power tools are so do you mind as a homeowner
do you mind managing multiple systems or would you rather have the systems that run both your power
tools and your lawn care equipment for me i don't care yeah i mean if if i'm doing a project in my
house i'm using my power tools when i'm cutting my grass i'm using my my trimmer and my edger and my
my lawnmower so to me they don't need to share a platform it's nice i think if all my op tools
share the same battery platform it simplifies but i don't i don't feel i need to have my power tools
power my op tools well it's it's back to the same thing that we were talking about with the
you know like an m12 or 12 volt i have a very specific reason that i want a smaller tool
i have a very specific reason that i want a outdoor power equipment line that gives
me enough run time and power for in my case a larger yard so i do think you can run into to to
well okay a great a great case in point would be a professional who's working on i
keep bringing up hvac but these guys just keep running into all sorts of really neat uses so
they might want a trimmer that runs on a 20 volt tool that powers their that runs on the
same stuff they're right because all they're doing is trimming around an hvac to get access
to it so you know they got two foot tall grass because some joker didn't trim his his weeds
around the the hvac unit and you just trim that stuff they're not professionally caring for lawns
yeah they're just getting access to where they need to be that's a great application for a 20
volt type product somebody with a really small lawn might luck out and have this be able to use
the same platform for their op that they use for their power tools but i think i don't mind going
big when you're talking about i mean you look at the higher voltage battery systems i mean they're
much much larger you want to you wouldn't want to put those on a power tool oh sure so to me it's
just kind of a practical thing i want the runtime i want the power so you make a great point you've
got more than an acre that you're dealing with and tom you got like a quarter acre in the city right
city lot yeah it's a little bit bigger i'm on one of these new developments where there's a lot
of houses on smaller lots i've got less than an eighth of an acre to take care of so you know you
got brands like ryobi doing their 18 volt heart on their 20 volt skill on the 20 volt those kind
of products are actually really good for my size lawn where i might only have five or ten minutes
of trigger time on a string trimmer yeah and if you're starting from nothing as a homeowner or
you just bought a new house you're just kind of getting into tools or you're younger or
you bought into one of those platforms to kind of do the kind of work that doesn't require something
that's like the max torque possible those it just makes a lot of sense to go bring that type
of op equipment in i mean that's a match made in heaven now you've got something that's going to
take care of the job you've got the same battery platform you're buying less batteries because you
can share them or when you do renew it you get that new battery now you can use with more tools
i i like that i just think that there's a really solid application for that
but it's going to be on those smaller lots it's going to be where that makes sense yeah and we
actually have a pretty big need for that here in florida because we have so many mobile home parks
yeah and those they don't have a lot of grass to take care of plus those tools are much lighter
weight with their smaller batteries and so for our folks that live in them it's just easier to handle
one other thing what let's talk about warranty for a second how does that play into your
decision in choosing a cordless platform yeah warranty is still like an indicator to me
it's not something i'm necessarily going to make a claim on i don't think it's more of hey
i think i can use this tool for the next year or two and now you're hearing that from you know a
contractor perspective and i think that's what we see a lot or if they do make a claim they're
kind of making them at one time they get a box of tools that have broken over the last year they're
all kind of still hopefully under warranty and they'll go get them taken care of but i think
where the warranty if you really want to execute a warranty and you really i think that's your
diy or your serious diy or your home user they're the ones that are really going to want to kind of
make sure they're i mean they yeah they're they're really really focused on value and they don't want
to buy a tool that breaks if it happens to break or something goes wrong they want to they want to
get it time is money with us so when that battery goes out we're going to go buy a new battery yeah
homeowner can go without a drill perhaps for a week or two or a month or whatever it needs you
know in theory easier than a contractor is gonna be they're they're just gonna go buy another yeah
and that's when it makes it so nice you know the stores or if you got a good relationship with your
local hardware store where you can take the tool back they can take take a quick look at it send
you home with a new one or be able to let you know hey i'll have this ready for you in a couple of
days or whatever yeah so there's just some really good stuff in there but i think you're right
warranty claims are probably more diy pros we're more focused on this as an indicator of what the
the manufacturer thinks this is going to last for and it tells us a lot so do you care tom
on if you're looking at tools do you care if it's a three year warranty versus a five year warranty
on the field if it lasts more than a year i'm happy if you get a year's use a hard use out
of a tool i think you're doing good i mean you're talking things get dropped off ladders they get in
hot trucks i mean when you're day in day out using tools um if i get a year to two out of a two i'm
i'm actually really happy with that so when i see three to five year as a warranty thing i'm like
you know hopefully i even get a little more traction out of that and that actually echoes
what we typically hear from users in the field they're if they get a year two other tools they're
really pleased with it they're irritated when it's only been six months and all of a sudden something
core breaks the other side of that too in a year or so well that's usually the next model coming
out anyways which means bigger faster stronger or whatever and at that point yeah i'm ready to
upgrade anyways and that will blow people's minds if you don't work professionally in that manner i
mean they will be like what are you talking about you know are you kidding me because they're just
they're thinking in terms of i've paid all this money for the tool it's got a five year i want
to last five years you yes that's probably a great mindset to have but you're not out there
you're not out there making money with that tool to the extent where it just becomes
a cost of doing business it's just a different way of thinking it's a consumable yeah so if
you're if that really irks you and you hear that you're probably just not using your tools that way
right and that's not a bad thing no no it's not no it's just different my dad has tools she he has
cordless tools from the original dewalt top posts which would be what 25 30 25 years ago yeah yeah
nycad yeah so he still has some of those laying around i don't know if they hold charges anymore
but when i saw him last time in the garage there's there's top posts he doesn't have any
lithium ion no they're nikon yeah yeah but just to show you you know longevity for the diy user he's
not a heavy duty user so his his original kit he still has that's a lot of great information
guys so just to recap real quick you know this has to fit your budget whether you're diy or
whether you're a pro it's got to get the job done and give you the results that you're looking for
it's got to survive whatever kind of job site that you're working on and keep in mind being able to
expand that platform into more compatible tools and maybe even ope and then remember you want
to like these tools so keep all those things in mind you have any other questions about
choosing a cordless platform let us know in the comments below and as always thanks for watching
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