cordless impacts?

[DB2]

I’ve had our 1/2 Milwaukee snap off new 5/8 plow bolts. They were not Cat brand however

 

[Twister]

No doubt they will. Technology on the cordless tools & batteries have come a long way. In my opinion, their worth buying now, then they were when cordless first came out.

 

[John C.]

Another problem I have with them is charging the batteries. Do you pull them out of the truck every night for charging? What do you do when you pull the tool out of the truck and the batteries are dead? What do you do when the battery goes dead in the middle of the job? How many extra batteries do you carry? Can you put something on the truck for charging them while you are driving?

 

[DB2]

We have an inverter in the cab and a six pack charger. Probably ten batteries in total The LED flashlights are in continuous use. Like anything else you just have to get in the habit of putting things in their place when you are done.

 

[Ronsii]

I have quite a few batts for my milwaukee stuff... around a dozen or two used to keep 4-5 for the dewalts(but only had 4 tools). If I only had the impact I'd probably just have two batts, but since I use the milwaukees for grinding,cutting,sawing,driving,drilling,chipping,etc... I might have 6-7 different tools out at once and I want them all to have a battery in them ready to go One of the biggest improvements in the batts is the idea to put a 'fuel gauge' on them... at the end of the day it takes me literally 10 seconds to check the batts and pull the ones that need charging out of the truck! They do make 12V chargers for them also and we've had them for the cordless grease guns in the past.

 

[Tags]

Doesn't leaving the batteries out in cold drain them or shorten their life, or am I just talking gibberish?

 

[Mike L]

I haven’t seen a noticeable difference when leaving them in the cold

 

[Ronsii]

Extreme colds/hots will make a difference... no matter what the sales brochure says


Used my 1/2" this morning for a little job had to pull the wheel on the kingquad so I could R7R the starter easier.



Simple job...right... of course one of the wheel nuts rounded over so I had to hammer a 1/2inch socket on it for 'reflatting' that's why it's still in the socket

But first I had to do a bit of grinding behind the airbox so's I didn't have to remove half the body panels to get it out.

 

[Twister]

I’d have to add too, that I haven’t noticed much either. They do way better than my Enpak Miller power unit on my truck, it really doesn’t like the extreme cold at all. Also would like to share, about inverters. My brother had picked one up, added to his Toyota and had issues powering his Dewalt battery charger. Come to find out his inverter puts out a square wave that the circuitry of the charger doesn’t like, and was told to go with a true sine wave inverter.

 

[John C.]

One last question then, a battery is a consumable item. Do any employers pay for replacements on them?

 

[Ronsii]

Some might.... don't really know??? I like to buy my own tools even when the boss wants to buy tools(usually buys the wrong stuff anyhow) I don't think of the batts as consumables... or at least no more consumable than the tool itself I think the days of tools lasting for 20-40-60 years when taken care of is long gone... unfortunately

 

[Twister]

Very good question John, so far knock on wood, I haven’t lost a battery yet. I’ll probably have one take a dump, as soon as I hit the send button after saying this statement.

 

[Ronsii]

I should be doing the brakes on the front drivers for the KW tomorrow unless plans change, so hopefully I remember to take pics and notes Plan on using the 3/4 milwaukee... I might have the 1/2 sitting there to spin one or two just to compare the feel...

 

[Ronsii]

Of course it had to rain Oh well.... the show must go on!!!!

Took less than a minute to zip the outer nuts off probably not quite as fast as my 1inch inline pneumatic gun but still not too bad for a bettery powerd gun either



Pretty much the same for the inner wheel... bout' a minute.

One thing I did discover is this 3/4 gun eats batts faster... I started with a 9amp batt(I think it was fully charged??? it showed 4 bars) when I started putting the wheel back on I got the inner on and the gun quit checked the batts fuel gauge and empty!!! Now there is a chance I grabbed a 9amp batt that had some use on it from the other day and still showed full... but even so when I used the 1/2 impact it still had 3 bars on a 9amp after R&Ring four tires....

 

[Snow Farmer]

Another battery impact convert here. I bought a 1/2" M18 impact earlier this year and love it. It is more powerful than my old I/R and C/P air 1/2" air impacts, much faster, and I don't have to wait for the compressor to refill again to get full power. Saves a lot of time changing wheels on our one ton trucks. No going back.
I also bought the M18 4 1/2" grinder for use away from the shop. Well worth it.

 

[Twister]

Be careful Snow Farmer, you'll end up dropping a couple thousand before you know it, like I and many others. LOL! I just wonder what took them so long to come up with tools to cater more towards the mechanical world. Seems like in the begining it was more for the carpentry industry. My m12 stubby 3/8 & m12 ratchets are awesome.

 

[John C.]

They started in the space industry and worked out from there.

 

[Ronsii]

Worked for nascar too.

 

[Ronsii]

Pulled off another set of wheels today in between other work... Go the first 9 nuts off and the last one wouldn't budge!!! sat on it for 20-30 seconds!!! so put two adjacent nuts back on and held em' down for a bit then went back to the stuck one for another 30 seconds!!! went back n forth a bit was just about to go grab something a bit more serious and tried it once more for 20 seconds and it finally started to move!!!! success

So started pulling the inner wheel off got two studs off and the impact quits...... 9 amp batt which I pulled right off the charger this morning was depleted so popped in another one and went on about my nut removal process got to the fourth one and it wouldn't budge... tried a few others got some off but there were four that just wouldn't move... anyways long story short I went through both 9 amp batts just pulling one set of wheels off, I'm not sure who put these on or how much torque they used but the 3/4 milwaukee was a bit under powered on this set!!!

And the hammer area gets hot enough to burn your forearm if you let it hammer away for a while