Anyone burn up a brushless drill yet?

[buz23]

Lots of success stories on cordless drill ice augers and a few horror stories with lower quality drills.  I am interested to know if anyone has had a serious failure with one of the higher end brushless drills or the batteries that come with them.  Tell us your experience here.  I know a few have snapped the T handle attachment off M18 drills, but I'd like to hear of more serious failures, if they have occurred.

[buz23]

I guess they're holding up pretty good.  Zero problems reported.

[Idahogator]

Yup, and a lot of folks read your post.     

[SKAMPO]

I twisted the T handle mount off of my M18 on a very cold day, I wasn't very happy to say the least. The material used in that portion looks very cheap. Other than that I doubt you will burn it up using common sense. I'm sure if you started drilling holes and didn't stop until the battery was dead you might do some damage. But I can't see where an ice auger will hurt it any worse than using large concrete bits all day??

[joefishmore]

Anybody figured out how to reinforce or makeover the t handle so it is stronger ?

[buz23]

Anybody figured out how to reinforce or makeover the t handle so it is stronger ?

Put that drill on a clam plate!  Much better control and you won't need the T handle.

Seriously, I think the Milwaukee is the only one that has reported T handle problems.  The T handles on a couple of the other brushless drills grab all the way around the back of the gearbox on the drill.

[SKAMPO]

Anybody figured out how to reinforce or makeover the t handle so it is stronger ?

Unless you're running larger than a 6" bit, I wouldn't worry about it. I find it packs away a lot nice without that big handle sticking out. I kind of have the same theory with the clam plate, just seems like extra weight to carry around.

[Agronomist_at_IA]

Lots of success stories on cordless drill ice augers and a few horror stories with lower quality drills.  I am interested to know if anyone has had a serious failure with one of the higher end brushless drills or the batteries that come with them.  Tell us your experience here.  I know a few have snapped the T handle attachment off M18 drills, but I'd like to hear of more serious failures, if they have occurred.

I havent had any problems with my Milwaukee brushless drill. I don't know for sure, but I remember reading something about the drill having a saftey measure in it where if it is getting worked to hard or to long it basicly just shuts down and stops. Wait a bit and it fires right back up. I never have had mine do it, and I drilled 2-3 holes at a time in 24 inches of ice.

[Gills-only]

They have a "safety" built in the battery that shuts don when almost out of juice, they just shut down!!

[3300]

li-ion batteries have cicuit overload protection in them. ni-cad did not and i have had them blow up. they are like grenades. they had memory and they were like a horse and would allow you to run it to the ground. li-ions also have a high and low shut down on them from chargeing of them so they don't get over charged and they don't get under dis-charged. li-ion are damaged when under discharged or over charged. very simular to gels in that regard.
so all of us will have a situation that one of these will happen to us and may not even know it. we know when the device quits and think the motor has let us down, but its the battery over load protection ciruit thats close to how a cicuit breaker works.

i have had ridgid drills for the longest time and also broke the aux handle on the 18 volt x4. it was a rather soft bolt running thru the handle and into the housing. it would bend and if you kept using, it would break. one of my ridgids is 24 volt and the aux handle has a band that wraps around the housing and no problem. ridgid does replace/repair any thing on it for life, but i didn't care to see how cheap the aux handle design was. they could have used a hardend bolt and a bigger one at that if they didn't want to go with the band method. i have the gen5x now and will check it out this ice season.

thinking its how much pressure you allow at the business end of the auger to take place, like when it breaks thru to water, if your lifting it so it takes a smaller bite or not or which auger you may be using or if its dull or bent, if you have issues at all. re-opening a hole is harder on all of it too.

i'm sure both tools mentioned are built very well other than the aux handles. the batteries are all the same except the brand used inside the packs. ridgid uses samsung now and used to use sanyo. being they are both owned by the same parnet company, they more than likely both use the same batteries. ryobi is also owned by the same parent company.

i have not had experience with brushless yet, but want to add what i thought was important info on the matter of failures to high end cordless tools.

[Shack man Shoney]

3 seasons later and no problems with the Milwaukee on my clam plate.... Only problem in having is deciding if I want to try the gen 2 fuel that claims nearly double the torque... The 9ah batteries that are rumored to be available in January should be a wonderful addition as well...

[ran7ger]

 the m18 fuel will shutdown if it gets overworked, mine has a few times but it runs an 8" finbore III and cuts holes in 3ft of ice.  no problems with the t-handle and it gets pretty cold around here  .  just got a clam plate so things should be good this winter.  still have the strikemaster honda when going out with a group of people in march once the ice is 4ft+.