Long story short; had a Kawasaki drill that burned up on me after about 3 uses - into the trash can. Got a Hitachi 18V and used it a few times, good drill. Also had a B&D cordless recip-saw and was gearing up for a project and found it wouldn't take a charge. Into the trash can. I got on Amazon and got a Hitachi saw that uses the same batteries as the drill. I had to replace my front steps (deck-type) and I'm glad to say both Hitachi tools were great. I did the whole job with the driver on one battery and it had power left over. Used all screws on this job, the new kind; coated, self-drilling, Torx head, some 3 1/2", many 2 1/2" and some 1 1/4". All required different torques and as long as I remembered to re-set it, everything was smooth.
Small job, I know, but it was the first staircase I ever messed with so I took my time with the preliminaries, drawing a few plans and doing lots of measuring. I didn't try to make anything perfect, just basically recreated what was originally built 24 years ago. The stringers were rough but good enough to serve as patterns. It came out pretty good so I felt right cocky about it. The amazing thing is, 90% of it is cutting the stringers and securely attaching them. Assuming you do that right, you slam on the treads and risers in a flash and you're done.
Obviously the whole porch has to be stained which I'll do after a couple of small repairs.
Small job, I know, but it was the first staircase I ever messed with so I took my time with the preliminaries, drawing a few plans and doing lots of measuring. I didn't try to make anything perfect, just basically recreated what was originally built 24 years ago. The stringers were rough but good enough to serve as patterns. It came out pretty good so I felt right cocky about it. The amazing thing is, 90% of it is cutting the stringers and securely attaching them. Assuming you do that right, you slam on the treads and risers in a flash and you're done.
Obviously the whole porch has to be stained which I'll do after a couple of small repairs.
