Thread: Should I get an impact driver to replace cordless drill?

Get one... End of story.

I have an earlier Aldi one and love it although when I burn it out I will get an AEG.
If you have arthritis then it is a requirement as it does not twist the wrist.

I agree Impact wrenches have torques there well above that needed for standard carpentry.

The only time I have found an impact wrench useful in woodwork was in large playground equipment construction where we were using 250+ mm long coach bolts to bolt logs together.
The 3/4" drive Makita wrench could drive the 250 mm coach bolt into the green log up to about 150 mm (no hole drilled) before tearing the head off.

I don't have one myself but I can see that a small driver could be very useful for self drilling screws but can't really see a need for one for general cabinet work.
One thing I note about them is they usually have much higher RPMs than drills so that makes them useful for longer threads.

In my honest opinion, for what you have listed above, it is probably overkill. Yes they are very handy and drive screws into timber with less effort, but I find that I have more control with a regular drill, and a drill is a HELL of a lot more quiet. I use both regularly, and if I was to just have 1 at my disposal, then I would go for a drill. Impact drivers are great at putting screws etc in and out, but if you need to drill holes then the special bits required are a heck of a lot more expensive.

Just my 2 c

Didn't really get why I needed one until I got one from SWMBO...I have the bosch blue 2 piece kit with 5 batteries...
It's my go to tool for connecting kitchen carcasses, screwing carcasses to the walls, pulling tops down onto carcasses, pretty much anything where I had a problem getting the driver to stay in the screw is now easy as...
I still use the drill/driver for assembly and drilling pocket holes. The ID is a bit over the top for pocket hole screw driving too..
It's even great for driving roofing teks, but with no torque adjustment you need to be on top of your game..

What David.Elliot said re being on top of your game. Very easy to twist the head off a screw with an impact driver or drive a screw straight though a piece of thinish timber. However, I wouldn't be without mine as an addition to my screwdriver/drill/hammer drill.

I do find my driver very useful and grab it practically every time I have a screw to screw in, however I work with hardwoods all the time and rarely touch manufactured board. My only advice on the issue would be is to get one that uses the same batteries as your current drill/s so there's less chargers and such to think about. You may even be able to get a skin which doesn't come with batteries or a charger but brings the cost down.

I haven't driven a screw into anything with a drill/driver for about 13 years. About 13 years ago I bought my first impact driver.

Thanks all.
My Makitas are NiMH which are about 8-15 years old, so I won't find any skins to match. But I do like the idea of getting a Li-ion brand I can add skins to later.

Does an ID work well on Phillips head? Or do they only work well on hex type heads?

With no torque setting, how do you stop burying heads in soft timbers? Do you just need to carefully time the release of the trigger? Or for my carcass/cabinet uses am I better off downsizing to a 12v instead of 20v?

Noisy damned things that make controlling the screw depth harder than it need be and that is a real problem. I have just consigned mine to the back of the cupboard hopefully never to be used again after I bought the Bosch 10.8V clutched driver. Providing you pre-drill, the new 10V drivers are perfectly able to do any normal cabinet work. I am biased, I just hate impact drivers but do use air driven impact wrenches doing landscape building all the time where they excel.

PS. I will give impact drivers one thing, they do not cam out of the screw head anywhere near what a normal driver does.

Originally Posted by david.elliott

It's even great for driving roofing teks, but with no torque adjustment you need to be on top of your game..

That's their biggest down fall I reckon. I'd get one right away if they had torque adjustment as standard.
I like the look of the Makita DTP141Z brushless, which has 9 clutch positions and 2 mechanical speeds but at nearly $400 that's not going to happen

One thing not mentioned yet is the the relative driving speed of the ID is a bit, to quite a bit slower, than a drill/driver, so you have more chance to get the depth of drive just.

Originally Posted by BobL

That's their biggest down fall I reckon. I'd get one right away if they had torque adjustment as standard.
I like the look of the Makita DTP141Z brushless, which has 9 clutch positions and 2 mechanical speeds but at nearly $400 that's not going to happen

And that is the skin only, expensive little blighter.

I wonder what those here use their impact driver to do, and in what material?

I do not drill deep or wide holes with my cordless drills. They are used for up to 3/8" max, and generally 1/4" and down. Mostly, for 1/16 - 1/8" holes for hinge screws, which I will use a hand powered screwdriver to complete. In other words, I want control over the drilling, which can be on the delicate side. The drills I have are a 5 year-old 10.8 v Festool C12, and a 20 year-old 12v Panasonic. Would an impact drill provide the delicate control that these do?

Regards from Perth

Derek

I wonder also Derek, a normal cordless 12V driver will snap an 8 gauge screw if the user is a bit heavy handed. I am also fascinated why people buy 18V drivers, drills yes but use it as a driver? The Festool C12 or at least mine is 12V BTW.