Drills

[Padraic]

So lads, I know nothing and plan on not learning a lot more, what I need to know is what sort of drill can I get that will be ideal for my homebrewing needs?

I will use it for:
Drilling plastic buckets
Drilling Kegs
Crank and Stein (Grain mill)
maybe drilling ss pots (I think there are some type of special stainless steel sheet cutters that are more appropriate.)

And any other uses you might imagine! I want to get it for as cheap as possible but not so cheap that it burns out when I'm grinding grains or drilling a hole in a keg!

[Shane Phelan]

I would be interested in this type of info too. My additional use to the one's you have listed would be for degassing wine kits. I have been shaking 1 gallon kits manually up until now but that isn't possible with a 5 gallon kit...

[newToBrew]

So lads, I know nothing and plan on not learning a lot more

love it !! sums me up !!

anyway Drills - plastic buckets - use a stanley knife, haven't hooked up to the mill yet - but.... most electric drills have a little slow to fast switch on them these days,

Wine Degassing - stuff like that I would imagine would be light enough


cheapo ones would prob do ya - it' s the anything else part that you may want to think on - I've burnt out 3 cheap o drills in @ 4 years, but thats from abuse - such as mixing plaster/tiling mix in buckets - Drilling Sleepers with Long Auger Bits - generally fking them over - I think I may have burnt out one on a Keg recently too
of course I had forgotten until recently  when I was drilling holes for a curtain pole !!
there was a nice burny smell in the house for a day or two
Anyway you get what you pay for I guess - me being a skinflint- I've always gone for the Cheap one at the time - false economy I guess when I could have bought  a decent one for the price of the three cheap ones I've gone through - but then I'd have to mind it - you know - "I paid good money for that now I have to take care of it - where as the cheap ones its like  ah fck it twas only cheap !! ..... I noticed homebase had one for @ 25 quid

I think woodies do their own cheap brand electric one  - ( its in yellow ) 

[Rossa]

Electric for milling. Battery dies and brewday gets delayed. Been there, done that.

I think mine is a B&D and is about 20 years old.

[JimmyM]

If you're looking for one to do all - id reluctantly say get an electric one.

Battery wont last pissing time drilling a keg
Electric would be overkill for drilling a plastic bucket for instance - and not very useful if you eg want to drive a screw into a piece of wood or something god forbid. (battery powered drill will stop immediately while an electric drill will spin for some time after you release the trigger)

Any man worthy of the thing in his pants (his wallet) should really have 1 of each.

[Cathal O D]

If you decide to go for a chordless drill make sure there is a spare battery included and always keep the batteries charged.Chordless is much handier and you will end up using it for many other little jobs around the house etc. For either type Make sure the chuck is large enough to take the drill bits you intend to use

[Shanna]

For battery choose Lithium ion 18v or higher with as high amperage as possible. Pay cheap money you get crap tools. Brands mentioned thus far are diy brands. Trades men use high quality high cost brands such as Makita or deWalt that cost a lot but do lots of work over a long period of time.

Group buy on 18v lithium ion 3 amp cordless drill with hammer action, battery charger, spare battery and carry case anyone?

Declan

If you're looking for one to do all - id reluctantly say get an electric one.

Battery wont last pissing time drilling a keg
Electric would be overkill for drilling a plastic bucket for instance - and not very useful if you eg want to drive a screw into a piece of wood or something god forbid. (battery powered drill will stop immediately while an electric drill will spin for some time after you release the trigger)

Any man worthy of the thing in his pants (his wallet) should really have 1 of each.

[Shanna]

Nope should have wriiten amperage.

Declan

For battery choose Lithium ion 18v or higher with as high ampage as possible.

Is that a real word?  

[DEMPSEY]

Nope should have wriiten amperage.

Declan

For battery choose Lithium ion 18v or higher with as high ampage as possible.

Is that a real word?  

Dont mind him Declan,there is a school teacher streak in him some where and the beyst way to keep it itched is too rite thyng,s propper like.

[christhebrewer]

I have owned, and do own a lot of power tools. I have to admit  I love tools! But I use them every day and they earn me money which is a completely different thing to drilling a couple of holes every few months. Shane is right, good tools are way better than cheap ones but I have a mains drill I got in Woodies for €19.99 and it is not bad at all! Some cheap battery drills are quite good too but the batteries probably wont last forever.
lf you have loads of money buy a good battery drill and you will love it. If not get a cheapie and it will probably do the job as well as is needed for the average brewer.
I recently got an 18v Hitatchi with lithium ion batteries for €225 in Scotts in Bray. I think it's the best value around.
I could ask them about a group but if there were any takers?

[christhebrewer]

Just thought of something else. If you want to drill stainless steel you need a drill which can do a very low speed. A good battery drill will be fine but you might kill a cheap one cutting steel. My cheap mains drill as quite difficult to control the speed on and you could destroy a holesaw in a few nano seconds.
Option one.....get a good drill
Option two.....get a cheap drill and find someone else to do the steel for you!

[Shanna]

If that came with 2 or more batteries, case and charger I would be interested. Any idea of the amperage? (that is  for you Tube/Shane/Tubinator etc)
[/quote]
Technically the amperage is the current being used, not being stored! When being stored you would use the word capacity.

Take a sample car battery. It has a capacity of 50 amps per hour, but the max amperage it can do is 320 amps (of the cc kind).

[Shanna]

Been drilling kegs recently with a step bit and had no bother. 2nd that go slow and even better if you can get somebody to squirt some kind of lubricant every so often to help things from over heating

Declan

Just thought of something else. If you want to drill stainless steel you need a drill which can do a very low speed. A good battery drill will be fine but you might kill a cheap one cutting steel. My cheap mains drill as quite difficult to control the speed on and you could destroy a holesaw in a few nano seconds.
Option one.....get a good drill
Option two.....get a cheap drill and find someone else to do the steel for you!

[christhebrewer]

This Hitatchi is a DV18DSFL, came with a case and 2x2Ah batteries.
My Dewalt 14.4v that I had for 10 years finally gave up (batteries won't hold charge anymore or else the charger is fupped). Anyway this Hitatchi is by far the best value I could find to replace it. It also does hammer action but that's a bit slow compared to an SDS machine. But that's not what it's for anyway.
I'll ask Frankie Scott about a deal if you can raise a few takers but I wouldn't bet on too much discount.
I said that's the best one I could find. There could easily be a better one.

[Shanna]

Half the battle with this sort of thing is finding a product that ticks the right boxes for good money. I do a bit of research to see if I can find the some drill for less before starting a group buy.

Declan