Thread: Newbie question about quality of tools and what to look for

You've pretty much answered your own question. Life span and cheap plastics.

The basic design of power tools is the same from Ozito to Festool; you might get variable speed or better ergonomics for your extra money, but they will all perform the same basic function. A lot of the difference in finish comes down to technique and consumables; a $500 jigsaw with the wrong type of blade for the job will still give you a crappy finish.

At the end if the day, it comes down to what you plan to do with them. If you're in the shed once every week or two, then cheap is usually good enough. Just don't expect it to survive several years of heavy-duty work.

Seeing that you're already committed with the Ryobi cordless ecosystem, stick with it. Then you don't have to worry about a new charger and batteries.

For what it's worth, my methodology for purchasing is buy the best you can afford, but I buy tools for work so they need to last. I'm also a bit of a brand snob

Ok, thats good news that I wont have to replace all my tools, I just wanted to make sure I would still get the accuracy I need to perform.

Good comment about the right blade, I have learnt the hard way about buying cheap fittings, always worth while buying decent blades etc.

+1 on Elan's comments.

The variables that get better (usually) with increased $pend are noise, quality of finish, performance, ease of use, features, dust extraction capabilities, and system integration.

For example, the are some Taurus (Aldi) tools that are ok as long as you can put up with 747 standard noise (Vac in particular). It's got plenty of sucking power, but not much of a filter system (which clogs quickly). Still, they're only $90 and it got me out of gaol for 12 months. Compare that with spending $2000 on a Festool vac with Autoclean etc. Do you get your value? Well I would say yes - in the longer term. The FT vacs are exceptional, and you can do a lot of things with ducting them etc.

Golden rule: $pend decent money on one tool rather than getting 2 or 3 cheapies, because it saves you $pending the money twice (which is in fact more expensive).

Where the rubber meets the road.
I see two lines:
1. Fabulous fit and finish, gleaming shiny tools. Those things normally come with precision and control for predictable results.
2. The opposite. The beaters.

What, exactly do you need these tools to do? Beyond the tool, beyond the shop, dust control and precision would set the bar quite high for tool/machine quality.

Blades, sanding media = where the tool meets the job.
Really poor blades will give you really poor surfaces no matter
what you spent on the tool, itself. Who said that? I can't agree more.
My bandsaw can give you lessons.

I can buy 4.5" angle grinders for less than $20 each for stone carving.
I buy 2 at a time. They blow up with dust and out they go.

The other thing that is worth taling about with anything with a motor is runout of the bearings.

Take a cheap circular saw for example. It doesn't matter what type of super fancy blade you put in it, if the runout of the arbor is excessive the blade will wobble and the finish will be poor. Not a big deal with an angle grinder, big deal with a table saw.

With respect to sanders, the orbit pattern makes a big difference to the finish as does the power. I had a cheap gmc 150mm sander that I always thought was quite good. That was until I bought a festool 90mm unit. If you looked at them side by side and thought about sanding a table top you'd think it was madness to pick the small one. The reality is the festool eats the GMC for breakfast. It's quicker and the finish is in a completely different class than the GMC. I reckon it'd take me about half the time to sand a table with the little festool than the big GMC.

I started a renovation business 10 years ago and bought a lot of GMC gear (which was going to be the seldom used stuff) to get me started along with a fair bit of Makita and Bosch blue for the critical stuff that I was going to be using all the time. I still have pretty much all of my Makita and Bosch stuff and I have none of my GMC stuff left.

Well, found my first couple of problems with the cheaper of the tools.

1) Two big green sheds dont stock the 150mm blades, which tells me my options are going to be limited.

2) Having to revise my plan for my DIY guide for it due to the fact there is about a 10mm gap between the item you are cutting and the motor sticking out, can alleviate this slightly by making the cutting depth less. From what I can see this is a design flaw on all the smaller circular saws, and really need to buy a big one to stop the clearance problem.

3) This is going to sound completely stupid, but are all circular saws designed for lefties? Am I missing something?


My old man still thinks I am crazy for using a battery powered circular saw and impact driver, but so far his mumbling about using extension cords seems to have died down! Not sure if I want to buy the battery powered angle grinder just yet though.

Originally Posted by Rychous

3) This is going to sound completely stupid, but are all circular saws designed for lefties? Am I missing something?


My old man still thinks I am crazy for using a battery powered circular saw and impact driver, but so far his mumbling about using extension cords seems to have died down! Not sure if I want to buy the battery powered angle grinder just yet though.

For some reason the manufactures have mains circular saws for right handed operation, and battery powered circular saws for left handed operation. There maybe some exception but these may need to be a special order.

Battery powered angle grinders have some pluses - no cord to cut through, no lead to plug in, no lead for others or operator to trip over. Down side is reduced power and limited run time on charge. So a lot will depend on where you want to use it and what you are using it for.

I like not having a cord to cut through. Yeah, ran a battery dry in no time today, but as I have 4 batteries its hardly a problem as Im too lazy to do that much work.

Just seems kackhanded to use it on my left, but I am sure I will get used to it, just got to sort out my DIY saw guide to give me a straighter cut.

Cordless saws are designed by (left handed) idiots. Even worse,they're criminally gutless. Some tools just really need 240v AC to achieve meaningful results.

Cordless grinders, however, are fantastic: at least the Bosch and Metabo ones I've used are. Makita's is terrible: gutless and forever shutting down even when only lightly loaded. Plus Makita's Li-ion battery platform is flawed as well, which kind of spoils their whole cordless range of tools too. Bosch use quality Samsung cells in their tools, and Metabo use top of the range Sanyo/Panasonic cells to provide unrivalled capacity and longevity.

Milwaukee has arguably the biggest and most sophisticated range on the market. As they also make Ryobi, AEG and Ridgid power tools too there's probably a bit of sideways engineering between these brands. Unfortunately Milwaukee isn't really up to snuff regarding their supposed "professional' applications either. My local tool repairer has literally bins full of dead, near new Milwaukee cordless (and corded) tools that have met a premature death on worksites. They just don't seem to be robust enough for worksite use, whereas millions of Makitas have proved themselves worksite tough the world over for the last 40 odd years.

Originally Posted by dalejw

The other thing that is worth taling about with anything with a motor is runout of the bearings.

Take a cheap circular saw for example. It doesn't matter what type of super fancy blade you put in it, if the runout of the arbor is excessive the blade will wobble and the finish will be poor. Not a big deal with an angle grinder, big deal with a table saw.

Spot on. circular saw and especially a planer. you simply cant buy cheap it you want good results. you can make do with a cheap router but it will vibrate (even in half inch) and chatter.
in the case of my first ever cheap tool an angle grinder- It got really hot fast anf I said i doubt it will last a day, ten years later and 4 set of brushes i still resort back to it after the lastest cheapy fails. oh year, brushes in cheap tools wear alot faster too.

to answer your question about jigsaws you will notice that heavy duty ones have a metal caseing houseing the reciprecating blade holder. the less movement here to less chance of runout and angled cuts. with a cheapy it is much harder to stop the blade running all over the place and cutting at angles. (my experience).