Do some of you guys sell or work for Makita? I only got involved in
this because of comments such as these:

"I won't buy anything but Makita from now on, it's just so good and
'does exactly what is says on the tin'."

"Its certainly a safe way to know you will get something that is at a
minimum "good" and will last (and I have never been disappointed with
any of my Makita kit)".

I don't work for Makita and have no connection with them other than
owning a couple of pieces of kit from them with which I'm very
satisfied.

Comparable manufacturers, Bosch and Dewalt also have product recalls -
on at least as serious safety-related defects:

http://www.boschtools.com/product-se...ations/CS1020/

(blade guard may stick open on circular saw)

http://www.cpsc.gov/cpscpub/prerel/prhtml07/07068.html

(short circuit may cause fire on reciprocating saw)

Your issue with Makita seems to be both the quality of the tools and
that they didn't pay adequate compensation in respect to an incident
in NZ.

Quality is on a par with other pro tool manufacturers - I would think
(from seeing what people around me use) Makita have about 50% of the
pro cordless drill market. They wouldn't have that unless those tools
had proved themselves safe, reliable, durable and effective in the
long term with large numbers of professional users.

As far as the compensation issue goes, there seems to be some aspect
of NZ law that is distinctly different "ACC", that many of the posters
on the original thread referred to - can you explain what this means?