Customer Reviews:
 Great tool September 5, 2008
R. von Kries (Smith Harbor, MA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
We use these an assembly section of our factory and they are excellent. Quick charge time, good power.
Approve!
 Makita drill September 1, 2008
William Nobles (Rio Rancho, NM United States)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I am pleased with the product. The only area of uncertainty was whether or not two batteries were included. They were, but I was not able to ascertain this for sure from the descriptive material. The unit is lightweight, powerful and well balanced. The keyless chuck works very well.
Very satisfied August 28, 2008
Y. Hsu (Dallas, Tx USA)
Has recently started my condo renovation; this drill driver has been a big help. Compact size allow me to use it everywhere that I need it; handy and light weight. the battery last long time! I'm very happy with this purchase. a recommandation tho, I would really consider the drill driver set if anyone's thinking of heavy drilling on mansonry stuff. This one would do, but the other one has more power; get both if you knew you will be running into mansonry drilling!
 What a great product, but with one pitfall August 7, 2008
K. Wilson (Ohio)
8 out of 9 found this review helpful
I've owned a 12v Dewalt drill for 10 years and although it still works great running on it's second set of battery's, I was looking for something with a bit more power,12v tools seem to run out of juice on larger heavier jobs so I was looking for an 18v drill.
Did some research and came up with the the Makita BDF452HW and ordered it from Amazon. First impressions great ! What a beautiful well balanced tool, fits in the hand very well, extremely light, ratcheting chuck, LED light, lots of torque for those heavy jobs, and the cherry on top is the quick charge Lithium ion batteries. I was very impressed with the whole package so I took it for a spin. By chance the first task that came to hand required some finesse, a 1/16" hole in a small computer connector, not the typical work for this heavy duty beast but you have to use your new toy.
When I drilled the hole, the drill bit shook and the drill itself seemed to have some vibration so I did so careful testing. After testing various bits and setups I determined that the chuck was off center and was causing any drill bits to wobble, not greatly, but enough you could feel it and enough to physically bend a small bit. I had noticed a previous review mentioned chuck wobble but after assessing the large number of positive reviews I dismissed it a just bad luck, it happens.
***** Five stars to Amazon's customer support, I returned the drill for an exact replacement, no charge and three days later I had another Makita in my hands ready to test. Sadly the second drill also suffered from the same fate, off center chuck causing the bits to wobble. I must be too critical so I compare drill holes with the Makita and my 10 year old Dewalt. I noticed two striking differences, the Dewalt was completely without any vibration, no doubt here, it was perfect. The second thing I noticed was the trigger speed control, the Dewalt was very smooth and seemed to be infinetly adjustable allowing me to very accurately control the speed, were the Makita had distinctive speed steps, not quit the control but definitely adequate. Oh yeh and the Dewalt weighted a ton compared to the Makita.
In conclusion, and honestly with great regret I sent the second Makita back for a refund ( ***** Stars to Amazon again !) and ordered the Dewalt DC720KA. It works great and has all of the features of the Makita with two exceptions, weight (its a heavy weight @ 4.8lbs but still very compact) and battery technology, still using NiCad battery's, rather than Lithium Ion.
The Makita is a great product if you can get lucky enough to get one that is put together well, sadly I had two in a row bad. Since the chuck is a little off center, this indicates poor manufacturing tolerances. This may have been a bad batch from a failed CNC machine, or it may be indicative of a more general problem, poor manufacturing practices that ultimately translate into poor quality and usually along with that a poor repair history, and a short product life. Only time will tell if this is a freak batch or indicative of a bigger issue.
better have a strong wrist August 4, 2008
J. Churay (pittsburgh)
This is a great drill. I first bought the 3ah version, BDF451, then bought this one because I hang a lot of drywall and wanted something lighter. I sometimes almost forget it's in my hand. It powers spade bits through joists no prob--in fact, the bit snagged once and the drill just about ripped my hand off my arm. It's smaller, it's lighter, and true, the battery lasts half as long, but there's no lack of power. Plus mine came with a rebate for a free third battery, so with two batteries cooking at any given time, there's always power laying around with the bigger batteries fitting the white tool (plus, and I don't know if this affects my warranty but, the smaller batteries fit in the blue tools if you chisel off that little square tab inside the rails where the battery slides on--not that I would recommend such a practice for, say, a circ saw, but there's no need for that big honkin battery on the flashlight). Only thing I think could be better is the VS--the trigger's a little too binary for my taste.
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