On Sat, 20 Nov 2004 21:15:35 -0800, "Harold & Susan Vordos"
wrote:



I think, for the most part, the home shop types tend to use their tools in a
rather light fashion. Certainly not continually, like a guy does that works
with his tools daily on the job. It is for that reason that when I buy a
tool that will get little to no use, I head for HF. If I'm going to get
inferior quality, I fully intend to pay a price in keeping with the quality.
If it serves my purpose for the job at hand, I'm pleased.

Some of that cheap stuff is remarkably good - 4" angle grinders being
one example that keeps on going longer than the price says that it
should.
A lot of the cheap tools seem to have really dodgy ergonomics -
square handles, poor balance, etc. Not stuff that would add to the
cost to make the tool
I also purchased a ½" Hitachi hammer drill while working on the castle. I
used it exclusively for drilling concrete, so it got little use. About the
third time I used it, perhaps ten days after warranty had expired, the
trigger switch died. Took it to an authorized repair station where I was
told "tough luck" and had to pay for a new one, which promptly died again.
Tough luck I was told yet again, so I never repaired the damned thing and
have never again purchased anything made by Hitachi, nor do I say anything
complimentary about them. The switch was obviously not suited to the
application. All I did was use it as it was intended to be used.
Incidentally, the failure was in the variable speed. The drill continued to
run, just on or off. It did that until about a month ago, when it quit
completely.

Any advice regards buying a new hammer drill that may not get much use? HF?
Can't afford, nor can I justify, a good one, like Hilti, which would be my
first choice if I worked with it daily.

On my experience, I would recommend Hitachi :-) My DW20 (1/2" chuck,
20mmm holes in concrete) is a good machine. It's predecessor was good
until someone stole it.
The triggers should be an easy fix I would have thought.
Geoff