Impact Wrench. battery or air

[Mike Kees]

Warren I use Milwaukee M18 impacts ,drill,skilsaw,and sawzall almost daily. Currently we have about 11 batteries,the three oldest were put in service in December 2012,still going strong. I switched to Milwaukee for everything in 2012. Like Makita but there were way to many battery issues in our climate here in Alberta.

[Warren Lake]

I think I read about that did look up the Milwaukees today lots of models all the way up to insane torque levels way more than my air gun two or three times. Makita never responded on the battery issue, ill try them again in case the salesman moved on. It didnt see enough use to crap out so likely ill change cordless tools five or six milwaukee so far I think.

[Tom M King]

I don't mix my mechanic tools, and woodworking/carpentry tools. It's a lot easier to wipe grease off of an all aluminum air wrench good enough to use on a mower, tractor, or vehicle next time, than keep my impact drivers clean enough to use inside finished houses.

[Jared Sankovich]

I have both pneumatic and milwaukee battery impacts. I all but quit using the pneumatics once I got the Milwaukees. I have 5 year old batteries in rotation and they still seem as good as the day I got them. I would say for most normal garage users the 18v compact and mid torque models cover everything. Most people don't need the 1000 to 1400 ftlbs of the high tq models.

I'm actually eager to pick up the m12 subcompact impact gun once it's available. At 250 ftlbs it should be able to fit in a lot of places a normal 18v battery or pneumatic guns cant.

[johnny means]

I'm thinking the cost doesn't justify itself if you don't use it. I've got a 3/8 Makita with ni-cad batteries, I'm pretty sure the batteries are toast. My pneumatic rarely gets used, but it'll still be in good condition when I'm in the freezer.

In a world where a family night at the movies is pushing three figures, the price differential sends like a wash top me.

[Darcy Warner]

In a world where a family night at the movies is pushing three figures, the price differential sends like a wash top me.

Why I don't go out to the movies. Plus I don't like crowds.

[Mike Hollingsworth]

On my travels I like to tour auto assembly plants, seems like all of the impacts have changed over to battery.
Very high end stuff with precise torque settings. No more noisy pneumatics.

[John Sanford]

As has been noted before, but bears repeating: There is a world of difference between an impact WRENCH and an impact DRIVER. As woodworkers, we're normally using impact drivers, so when we say "impact", 95% of the time we mean driver. A mechanic says "impact", 95% of the time he means wrench. Just look at the specs of the two types of tools. Impact drivers are rated in inch-pounds, impact wrenches are rated in foot-pounds. With the exception of the really cool Bosch 18v tool John mentions above, pretty much all impact drivers use a 1/4" hex female socket. Off topic: My dream impact tool would combine the hybrid nose of the Bosch with the oil-hydraulic impact system (Makita, Hitachi and the TTI family have some available), running 3 speeds in a DeWalt XR platform pushing about 150ft-lbs.

As far as the batteries going dead, to me that makes no sense. I'm into two systems, Bosch for 12v, and DeWalt for 18v (20v by their marketing). I have multiple tools in each (5 DW, 6 Bosch, with 2 on the horizon), multiple batteries in each. I don't dedicate a battery to a tool, I simply pool them. When a battery dies I put it on the charger and then either grab a charged spare off the shelf or one from another tool. Actually, now I have 3 systems, because I got into Makita's 18v when I picked up a track saw recently. The batteries are in constant rotation. I'm still using some Bosch batteries that are branded with the actual voltage, 10.8, before they jumped on the "12v" bandwagon, i.e. about 10 years old. (Btw, anybody who wants to hammer Stanley B&D for their 20vMax marketing should just consider that EVERY manufacturer selling in the US today is marketing 10.8v tools as 12v.)

I am just a doofus hobby guy with delusions of handy-competence, but if I can manage to not be caught out unable to work because of dead batteries, anybody should be able to it. The key is pool and rotate.

[Ken Combs]

As has been noted before, but bears repeating: There is a world of difference between an impact WRENCH and an impact DRIVER. As woodworkers, we're normally using impact drivers, so when we say "impact", 95% of the time we mean driver. A mechanic says "impact", 95% of the time he means wrench. Just look at the specs of the two types of tools. Impact drivers are rated in inch-pounds, impact wrenches are rated in foot-pounds. With the exception of the really cool Bosch 18v tool John mentions above, pretty much all impact drivers use a 1/4" hex female socket. Off topic: My dream impact tool would combine the hybrid nose of the Bosch with the oil-hydraulic impact system (Makita, Hitachi and the TTI family have some available), running 3 speeds in a DeWalt XR platform pushing about 150ft-lbs.

Dewalt's impact wrench and driver are somewhat the exception from most. The different parts, forward of the impacting mechanism itself, are interchangeable between the impact driver and the 3/8 drive wrench. Some guys on another forum had this discussion and actually did the swap.

I know the driver version is way to strong to use as an impact wrench with the hex to 3/8sq adapters. I do that a lot and have broken a number of the adapters when doing stuff that should be left to my air tools.

[Malcolm Schweizer]

I have the Milwaukee M18 1/2" drive impact. I had a trailer hitch on my Jeep that had been scraping on driveways and speedbumps, and I knew it would be a pain to get off, as the threads were mashed. I gave it one good hit with the M18 impact, and it came right off- the nut rethreaded the damaged threads on the way off. It's a beast- more power than my air driven impact.