Your first cordless drill?

[dnschmidt]

Mine was porter cable gray. They also sponsored new yankee workshop.

Mine was called "The Magnaquench" I think. At that time PC was top of the line not dogshit like it is today.

 

[seber]

I tried a Makita 9.6v for a while, but it wouldn't really drill holes. The first real one was a Milwaukee, 18v nicad. That worked well until lithium was perfected.

 

[klassenl]

My dad had a Makita 9.6 with the stick batteries that unused when I worked with him. A few years later I bought one for myself. Drive many screws with it. I still have it.

 

[Under_Pressure]

My own first cordless drill was a Makita 12V nicd that my dad gave me for christmas in HS. That kind of set me on the Makita path- when I upgraded to 18V li-ion I stuck with them and got firmly implanted in the Makita universe, and have bought many thousands of dollars of tools since.

The first cordless drill I remember my dad having was a Bosch- 9.6v I think? Must have been early 90s at latest. The first cordless tool I remember everyone (my dad, grandpa, uncles) getting in the 80s, though, was the B&D cordless screwdriver. My dad might still have the charger/holder mounted on the wall in his basement...

 

[Bubba Fett]

My first one was some no-name brand I bought from a discount store. I wasn't impressed, but it was used mainly as a cordless screwdriver. Then one day I tried a DeWalt...

 

[freudianfloyd]

Mine was a Freud 14 volt I believe. They had two on clearance at a local hardware store, I bought one and my dad bought one. They were the bee knees when you were used to the corded ones. My dad still has his, albeit the batteries are long dead.

 

[JradM]

Dewalt 12v XRP - e.g. the ni-cd version. It was a nice little drill at the time. Woefully underpowered compared to today's offerings.

It was somewhat of a premium offering when I bought it, with it's three speed transmission and metal chuck.

 

[carmantl]

Makita 7.2 and it still works! Bought an old adjustable pitch rotary laser and it uses the same ni-cad batteries. Those first batteries are close to 30 years old and are down on power some but they all still work.

 

[Kuma601]

Still have that Panasonic EY6101. Had the battery packs rebuilt and it continued to be used up till about 4 years ago. I still like that drill and would have preferred to keep using it. Rebuilding nicad packs and their characteristics was a dead end. Could use nimh but consideirng the cost it was easier to by new tech. Replaced it with a Metabo HPT set...hammer/drill and impact driver.

 

[dave*99]

Sears - it looked like this except it had a chuck. Late 70's or early 80's.
It pre dated my second drill which was a Makita 7.2V

 

[Kuma601]

Sears - it looked like this except it had a chuck. Late 70's or early 80's.
It pre dated my second drill which was a Makita 7.2V

I had that screw driver too and it may still be in the depths of the garage somewhere.

 

[javyLSU]

Black & Decker, bought at K-Mart. Kids, you can type that name into the Google machine and learn what that was...

 

[rslaback]

One of these babies. Note the non-removable battery and the blazing fast 3 hour recharge time.

 

[isb cornbinder]

Our first cordless drill was a Black and Decker. This was in the mid 1960s. The drill appeared to be a quality tool, but the battery system was junk. The battery would last for a week and then B&D would replace it. After a few months B&D refunded our money.

 

[ArmyVW_GuyInTX]

Makita 9.6 with the keyed chuck and flashlight, probably still have it somewhere. Now all Bosch 12V and 18V and Bosch corded.

 

[CoogarXR]

Sears - it looked like this except it had a chuck. Late 70's or early 80's.
It pre dated my second drill which was a Makita 7.2V

My first cordless drill that was my own (not my Dad's) was some no-name knock-off of the one you have pictured. Wall-wart charger that probably took 8 hours to charge, and would drill about a dozen holes before it died again. I had it in my car, and my car was broken into, and they stole it. But the joke was on them; the charger was at home. And, well, it was a POS too, so double-joke on them.

Around 1998 I bought the Black and Decker VersaPak lineup. Drill, saw, lantern, etc. I used the hell out of it. I sold it all around 2005-ish and downsized to just corded tools.

In 2008-ish, I got a job at an electronics recycler and they had the Hitachi 10.8 tools. WOW! I loved using them so much that I bought the whole lineup for myself. Drill, impact, flashlight, sawsall, right-angle impact, etc. I still use those to this day, and love them to death. I just used the sawsall a few minutes ago to cut up some metal for scrap.

 

[brownbagg]

bought the makita brand new, around 88, put it on the shelf, never been touch

 

[f121]

JCB 18v, it was fantastic for it’s time and eventually died when my dad had borrowed it. Dad replaced it with a top of the line dewalt 18v, all metal gearbox, chuck, genuinely solid and weighed a tonne. Still have it, but no working batteries.

 

[alinc100]

Skill Topgun in the late 80s ish.

Me too

Me Three. I bought mine at Sears in 1990 in Los Angeles,CA. I was working remodeling grocery stores and installing shelving and cooler systems. Everyone needed a cordless and (I believe) that particular SKIL was based on the Black& Decker Kodiak/Industrial series that had been a favorite of contractors back then for longevity and durability. I've since owned Dewalt,Makita,Ryobi and Milwaukee in cordless tools and use them daily on jobsites. The Ryobis were 12 v I believe and didn't hold up well.

 

[stonesfan68]

I think that it was a Craftsman 12V, but it my have been a 12V DeWalt.

 

[Dakotadadv8]

Rigid from Home Depot decades ago battery lasted 5 years.

 

[Mr. Wonderful]

I bought the DeWalt 14.4v drill in the mid 90's while in trade school. It was a lot more powerful than the 9.6 Makita and 12v Milwaukee at the time. After about two weeks the whole gearbox stripped out. I returned it and got the Milwaukee 12v. I think I got about ten years use out of it! I still have it although I'm sure the batteries are long dead. It came with a great metal case too.

 

[65ranchero]

I fell into the Makita 9.6 stick battery group
Bought drill ( metal case w/ charger and battery) bought extra battery and then bought flash light, right angle drill and the 3" (I think)
saw.
bought several batteries and had batteries rebuilt over time.
Sits on the shelf and batteries go dead because I don't use it very much.

 

[DrinkMan]

Mid '90s (?) Makita with removable NiCad battery. Thought it was fantastic and did a lot of "big" projects with it. Battery slowly went. Spent almost as much money as I had on the entire drill kit on a replacement battery. Battery didn't last long. Went to Ebay to buy the next battery. It lasted as long as the previous battery. Repeat... I was getting sick of how expensive it was to keep using it Then we had a break-in and many of my tools were stolen. I have to admit that I was very pleased to see that the Makita, case, and accessories (including 2 batteries) were all stolen. (I wasn't pleased to see the Stihl chainsaw with 3 different bar sizes with chains stolen...) When I made my list of stolen items with serial numbers (TV's, computers, microwave, tools, etc....), I confess that I did not include the Makita on the list (just in case they recovered things at the pawn shops).

 

[BreeStephany]

My 'first' drill was a right angle Makita 7.2V NiCD that my father had, but the first drill I bought for myself was a Milwaukee 0624-9 1/2" 18V NiCD hammer drill. Coming from having only used the Makita, I was extremely impressed with its power and capabilities.

I quickly upgraded to Milwaukee's V28 (now M28 line) and still using the tools today, almost 15 years later. I have since upgraded to M28 batteries, since I didn't use the tools for a few years and let the batteries brick themselves from low cell voltage. I am still VERY impressed with the power of their bandsaw, SDS+ hammer drill, 1/2" impact wrench, Sawzall, etc.

Today I have quite a mix between Makita and Milwaukee and love both. My daily carry is Makita, but if I need something special / trade specific, Milwaukee is my go-to.

 

[subroc]

Dewalt 14.4. It was a good tool. I remember the first project I used it on. I replaced the stockade fence sections on some existing posts. It drove the screws fine. The 2 batteries held up fine for the project.

In those days many battery powered tools had the reputation of being underpowered. That had me hold off on adding to it.

Eventually an 18v 4 piece set was added. I sold the 14.4 drill. Added 18v pieces as needed. Added 20 volt stuff with battery adapters to use with the 18v tools, etc. Now I have a mix of 18v, and 20v brushed and 20v brushless and a 60v saw with many corded pieces as well.

In the end, that 14.4 was a good tool with enough power that after I started using it I never used my corded Craftsman drill again.

 

[dave*99]

Stay on topic. What was your first cordless drill. I’ll spare you the Makita to DeWalt to Milwaukee path I followed. GJ has many threads discussing the attributes of the latest tools.

 

[Tennessee Cattleman]

 

[Doubled33]

Early 80’s black and decker drill. It had a battery that looked somewhat trapezoidal with a protrusion and clipped in with a metal clip and it was grey in color.

Then

Late 80’s 9.6v Makita. Sam’s club as I remember and around 200 bucks.

Today mostly Dewalt and a little Milwaukee.

 

[Citation]

My uncle gave me a B&D 9020 6V cordless drill. It had a 5 cell, internal Nicad pack. It got low speed by drawing power from only 3 of the 5 cells.

My first good cordless was the 12V version of the famous Makita stick battery drill. My local Sears had it on the "used" table for something like $30. The battery contacts didn't have a scratch on them and the drill looked absolutely unused. It was a good drill but compromised compared to later NiCad drills by things like a rather fast minimum speed, a strange trigger, strange gear shift control that required the drill to be turning when shifting and those really long batteries. I picked mine up when the Makita stick drills were being phased out.

Still, it was a word apart from the old B&D. It was actually powerful enough to do real work.

 

[driftpin]

An old Ni-cad. 12 V DeWalt very similar to this (internet pic). Still have it, batteries are dead. I got them replaced/rebuilt once, but they didn't last but a year. I went with 19.2 V Craftsman L-ion and those have been OK for my hobby use.

 

[ezover]

craftsman from about 1981, my parents got it for my 16 birthday. honestly i dont think i ever used it. still have it sitting in the bottom of my tool box.

 

[crewchief888]

craftsman 1998

 

[finn]

Black and Decker gifted from my father in law as a Christmas present in about 1991. Long gone now, as the batteries weren’t easily replaceable.

that was followed by 9.6 volt Craftsman “Industrial” , of which I ended up with two. My son worked at Sears Hardware during the summer while in college in the mid nineties, and his manager gave him a killer deal. Still have them somewhere, but I got tired of paying for rebuilt batteries.

A Black and Decker Firestorm kit fell in there sometime in the late nineties. Garbage charger had no fuse so it blew up. Trashed the entire set. The drill was ok for home use, while it lasted.

Then a Bosch brushed 18 v lithium from Menards and a Skill ( when they were owned by Bosch and my other son worked for another Bosch division and had access to refurb tools for cheap at the company store.

Latest one is a Dewalt 20v brushless. The Dewalt, Bosch, and Skill are in regular use.

 

[CJM8515]

I used my dad's 9.6v Makita growing up.

same here. wonderful tools for their time.

my first drill i bought on my own was a porter cable (before they became a crappy consumer brand) 9.6V. Then i bought a porter cable impact/drill set 18v lith ion.

I now use nothing besides milwaukee fuel tools

 

[jmarkwolf]

In the early nineties, mine was a Singer (as in the sewing machine people?). Can't remember the voltage nor where I got it, but I do remember it melting when I dropped an acetone laden rag on it!

 

[jessesandy]

My Ford got stuck in a parking lot with a bad ignition switch. Needed a portable drill to drill it out.
The cops took a look but did say any thing.

 

[jives]

I was a bit late to the game. Early 2000s Bosch Brute. By the time the NiCad batts were toast it was time to move on to lithium ion. Gave it away free on CL I did drop it and mussed up the chuck, but this was after dropping it a zillion times. It was stronger built than my current Makita, but heavy as a sack of bricks. Also, terrible ergonomics.

 

[lardy1]

Mine was called "The Magnaquench" I think. At that time PC was top of the line not dogshit like it is today.

I still have the box. I modified it for my Bosch sabre saw.

 

[exmaxima1]

Panasonic, possibly the first generation. It was an amazing tool in its day.

This is NOT my actual drill---my shop is not that tidy!