I went looking for the Milwaukee drill that I posted about previously, but when I found it at Home Depot it turned out to be an electric screwdriver. The distinction may seem minimal; after all, they both rotate a bit, right? Well, the screwdriver doesn't have an adjustable chuck, or didn't as near as I could discern given the limited range of the 3" Home Depot security cable. They did have the 3/8" drill, and it was still quite small and light compared to a "normal" drill, but it was $149. The sales dude pointed me at the Rigid (Home Depot store brand) variant, but even with the tiny lithium battery it was nearly the size of the regular drills. I decided to look elsewhere.
I go past a Sears on the way home so I pulled in to see what they had. Well, they had a lithium battery 3/8" drill that looked identical to the Milwaukee drill in everything but the branding. Sears being the home of Craftsman tools and all, I suspect they wanted to have their own branding on it. It had the same torque rating, the same two-gear speed ratings, and the battery even looked the same (although I wouldn't be surprised to find that they aren't interchangeable). The difference was the price: $89.
Here it is in a side-by-side comparison with my old drill:
It's not much bigger than an air drill and there's no hose to drag around. Nice!
Even without the more manageable size, I was going to have to buy a new drill anyway. The batteries on the old one are at least five years old and only hold a charge for a few minutes at a time these days. Replacement batteries, even if available, usually cost more than buying an entirely new tool.
Planned obsolescence at its finest!
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