Anyone got any experience with either of these?

Peter

I think they're quite good value, just the thing for occaisional use. The
cordless ones don't seem as good, slow charging and underpowered.
"Peter" wrote in message
...
Anyone got any experience with either of these?

Peter

On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 06:41:27 +0000, Peter wrote:

Anyone got any experience with either of these?

Yes. Which ones in particular?

PoP

Sending email to my published email address isn't
guaranteed to reach me.

On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 06:41:27 +0000, Peter wrote:

Anyone got any experience with either of these?

Peter

It's a case of you get what you pay for.

I have purchased some at various times and found that I've had to
return them through failure or being underpowered. B&Q routers were a
prime example of this. The cordless tools tend to have poor
quality batteries and poor motor control, especially the cordless
drills and screwdrivers.

I tend to use the majority of power tools that I buy quite a bit, so
I'm also looking for accuracy and ease of use. Unfortunately this
doesn't seem to come either in my experience.

I don't subscribe to the notion that because something is for DIY
purposes that it has to be cheap. While part of the purpose of DIY
is to save money relative to using a professional, I think that the
other aspects are to get a job done when and as I want to do it and to
achieve a result equally as good, if not better.
Unfortunately I have found on several occasions that the own-brand
tools fall short in one way or another.

The DIY chains' marketing policy is to deliver products to a price to
attract buyers and to move a large volume of them. A keen eye is kept
of turnover per square metre in retail operations of this type. In
order to address customer perception problems, a 2 or 3 year warranty
is given. However, no service operation is provided. The retailer
plays the numbers game and simply replaces faulty product with new,
tossing the defective one in the skip. They have acceptable return
rate clauses in their supply contracts. At the end of the warranty
period, the tool has to be considered scrapped. The stores do not
generally have spares or service operations for the products.
B&Q were quite clear to me about this when I called their help line
recently.
Occasionally, one might be lucky and find that the same tool or one
close enough to it coming from the same private label factory in China
is being sold elsewhere and there is parts backup but this involves
time and detective work.

Of course, one might be lucky and with occasional use a tool might
last longer than the warranty period, but it would be prudent to
budget replacement at the end of the warranty period.
Another factor is that I don't particularly want to waste time and
fuel returning defective products to the store for replacement - that
eats into the DIY cost equation as far as I am concerned.

Having said all of that, I am not against the notion of buying store
brand tools, per sec. If it's a question of budget being an issue,
something is for occasional use and limitations are accepted, then
fine. I am just surprised when people expect to buy something
cheaply and expect high quality and reliability, and are shocked when
they discover that there is no backup.

If it is a choice between having and not having, then there are
certain types of tool that will do a job that is worthwhile and save
time. I would count a chop saw and a portable table saw in this
category. There are sometimes total duds like B&Q's router and their
collated screwdriver. However, inadequacy generally becomes
apparent quite quickly.




..andy

To email, substitute .nospam with .gl

Anyone got any experience with either of these?

Performance Power tend to be pretty lame. Performance Pro tend to be pretty
good, with well designed ergonomic handles etc. There are both excellent
examples and lemons in both ranges, though. I'd post about a specific tool
for specific opinions.

Christian.

Peter wrote:
Anyone got any experience with either of these?

Peter

Well, I bought a £40 PPower 14v cordless drill from B&Q in Jan 03 and I've
been VERY pleased with it. The £30 version didn't have variable speed
trigger (either on or off at 'screw' speed or 'drill' speed depending on
switch) and had a 3-5 hour charger, so I bought the £40 version and didn't
get all the drills/bits that came with the £30 option.

It might have poor batteries - I don't know. Mine stay charged for weeks
and always ready for whatever job I've given it when I take it out again.
Okay, it may not be used for 2/3 weeks at a time - so the usage isn't
heavy - but for my jobs - I've never regretted buying it - its been
wonderful!

That's my experience.

David

In article , Peter
wrote:
Anyone got any experience with either of these?

My Homebase SDS lasted about 4 hours - now runs like a sick puppy so
I presume I've burned out one of the armature segments. I didn't
take it back because (a) I've lost the receipt and (b) with
hindsight I was pushing it way too hard: it looks a serious piece of
work and is probably fine for drilling intermittent holes, but I was
using it for 10 minutes at a time in hammer mode demolishing a block
partition. I replaced it with the £140 Wickes/Kress one which (a) is
hopefully twice as durable; (b) if not, it's sold as 'professional'
and has a 2-year guarantee, so if it breaks I would feel entitled to
claim; and (c) if it breaks thereafter BMJ are up the road and can
fix it.

I am a bit gutted about my Homebase SDS: if the whole drill was
£60-ish (on a 10% day) then a new armature would only be £15 if
parts were available: but I presume they're not (haven't asked
though so would be glad to be corrected). I am just green enough to
feel really bad about it end up in landfill so soon.

--
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Free SEDBUK boiler database browser http://www.sda.co.uk/qsedbuk.htm

Tony Bryer wrote:

work and is probably fine for drilling intermittent holes, but I was
using it for 10 minutes at a time in hammer mode demolishing a block

I would not have thought that 10 mins continuous use counts as
unreasonable even for a cheapie tool...

--
Cheers,

John.

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Argos do power tools that are fine for light diy use, you can extend
the g'tee to three years for a fiver.

Depends where you like shopping least!

cheers,
Pete.

If you bought it with a "card" of some sort--they should be able to search
it out of their system. Won't work if you used real cash money though. Still
worth a try. If the store manager wants to keep you as a customer he can do
it. Go for it.

Thanks to all for the advice. I agree you get what you pay for. I
was considereing a cheapie router, as I have never used one, so
thought I'd get a cheapie to see how much I would use it and then go
for a good one if the answer was a lot!

Peter
On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 20:01:44 +0000, Pete C
wrote:


Argos do power tools that are fine for light diy use, you can extend
the g'tee to three years for a fiver.

Depends where you like shopping least!

cheers,
Pete.

"Peter" wrote in message
...
Thanks to all for the advice. I agree you get what you pay for. I
was considereing a cheapie router, as I have never used one, so
thought I'd get a cheapie to see how much I would use it and then go
for a good one if the answer was a lot!

Peter


I'd never used a router until a couple of years back. After asking a joiner
to do a small finishing job for me and him telling me to borrow the router
and do it myself, I then got the bug I went out and did the same as you're
thinking now, I'll get a cheap one to see how it goes. After using the
cheap one until it died, I went out and got myself a Bosch industrial one
that goes from low speed to high speed and does all the table tops, the
board edges, the fancy bit for repairing skirting boards and door facings.
All in all, I can honestly say that I wouldn't be without it now. The
amount of work it has brought in from friends and relatives is also paying
for its up-keep. :-))


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On Tue, 20 Jan 2004 06:57:49 +0000, Peter wrote:

Thanks to all for the advice. I agree you get what you pay for. I
was considereing a cheapie router, as I have never used one, so
thought I'd get a cheapie to see how much I would use it and then go
for a good one if the answer was a lot!

I have a B&Q Performance power (Or is it pro?) Router and it's very
good.

sPoNiX

On Tue, 20 Jan 2004 08:49:09 GMT, (S P O N I X)
wrote:

I have a B&Q Performance power (Or is it pro?) Router and it's very
good.

I do hope that's not the B&Q Power Pro 2050W that I took up major
bandwidth on this newsgroup about several months ago.....my experience
was anything but positive. Words such as "barge pole" existed in my
recommendation to others.

PoP

Sending email to my published email address isn't
guaranteed to reach me.

S P O N I X wrote:

I have a B&Q Performance power (Or is it pro?) Router and it's very
good.

Watch the 1/2" 2kw one though - its lowest speed was far too fast for
safe use of larger cutters when I looked at it (did not go below 15K rpm
IIRC).

--
Cheers,

John.

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\================================================= ================/

In article , PoP
wrote:

On Tue, 20 Jan 2004 08:49:09 GMT, (S P O N I X)
wrote:

I have a B&Q Performance power (Or is it pro?) Router and it's very
good.

I do hope that's not the B&Q Power Pro 2050W that I took up major
bandwidth on this newsgroup about several months ago.....my experience
was anything but positive. Words such as "barge pole" existed in my
recommendation to others.

PoP


I've got the older smaller one (1250W?, definitely PPPro) and have been
quite happy with it. However, it is the first router I've ever owned,
so I don't have anything to compare it to. (Except for a rather manky
one I hired several years ago which had an incredibly sticky plunge
mechanism. It was a total pain in the ass).

The fence is rubbish, but so far I've not needed to use it. The
dust-extract cover limits plunge depth but is easy enough to remove for
deep cuts.

Just fettled together a board that allows me to use it inverted,
clamped in a workmate, to act as a table-mounted router. Now why didn't
I do THAT earlier - very useful even if it doesn't have the
super-perfectly-flat-and-a-million-features of a commercial table. Not
exactly easy to alter the plunge depth, but not too bad.

David



--
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Unsolicited commercial email will incur a $100 processing fee

"S P O N I X" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 20 Jan 2004 06:57:49 +0000, Peter wrote:

Thanks to all for the advice. I agree you get what you pay for. I
was considereing a cheapie router, as I have never used one, so
thought I'd get a cheapie to see how much I would use it and then go
for a good one if the answer was a lot!

I have a B&Q Performance power (Or is it pro?) Router and it's very
good.

I've got the Wickes one and it's utter crap.

Tony Bryer wrote in message , so if it breaks I would feel entitled to
claim; and (c) if it breaks thereafter BMJ are up the road and can
fix it. Snip, snip,

Tony,

Just FYI I thought BMJ Power had gone bust?

Rgds

Noel

noel dot hegan at virgin dot net

On 20 Jan 2004 15:37:05 -0800, (Noel
Hegan) wrote:

Tony Bryer wrote in message , so if it breaks I would feel entitled to
claim; and (c) if it breaks thereafter BMJ are up the road and can
fix it. Snip, snip,

Tony,

Just FYI I thought BMJ Power had gone bust?

Yep. Company no. 3248182 in liquidation.......


Rgds

Noel

noel dot hegan at virgin dot net

..andy

To email, substitute .nospam with .gl

G&M wrote:

I've got the Wickes one and it's utter crap.

There is one Wickes one that looks like a badge engineered version of
the Freud FT2000E which seems well regarded:-

http://www.screwfix.com/app/sfd/cat/...17864&ts=44388

(very pleased with my one - got the Freud since the Wickes own brand was
more expensive at the time!)

--
Cheers,

John.

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"John Rumm" wrote in message
...
G&M wrote:

I've got the Wickes one and it's utter crap.

There is one Wickes one that looks like a badge engineered version of
the Freud FT2000E which seems well regarded:-

http://www.screwfix.com/app/sfd/cat/...17864&ts=44388

(very pleased with my one - got the Freud since the Wickes own brand was
more expensive at the time!)

No - it's a lower powered one - same as the NuTools.

"G&M" wrote in message ...
"John Rumm" wrote in message
...
There is one Wickes one that looks like a badge engineered version of
the Freud FT2000E which seems well regarded:-

http://www.screwfix.com/app/sfd/cat/...17864&ts=44388

(very pleased with my one - got the Freud since the Wickes own brand was
more expensive at the time!)

No - it's a lower powered one - same as the NuTools.

They have the Freud one too - 1900W - on clearance at the moment.

In article , Noel
Hegan wrote:
Just FYI I thought BMJ Power had gone bust?

I collected my fixed B&D drill from the branch in Brentford (behind
PC World) last Saturday and they were very much in business then.
But I couldn't swear it was BMJ: to me it's still the B&D shop.

--
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Free SEDBUK boiler database browser
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PoP wrote in message . ..
On Tue, 20 Jan 2004 08:49:09 GMT, (S P O N I X)
wrote:

I have a B&Q Performance power (Or is it pro?) Router and it's very
good.

I do hope that's not the B&Q Power Pro 2050W that I took up major
bandwidth on this newsgroup about several months ago.....my experience
was anything but positive. Words such as "barge pole" existed in my
recommendation to others.


That's the one I have and I'm more than pleased with it. I don't use
any of the "free" cutters though.

Andrew

On 21 Jan 2004 03:53:33 -0800, (Andrew)
wrote:

That's the one I have and I'm more than pleased with it. I don't use
any of the "free" cutters though.

The £99 jobbie. Easily the most awful router I've tried to use. The
problems included the following:

1) For a 2KW router it had the performance of 800W. It literally
slowed down significantly when taking only a minimum cut.
2) The depth lock did not grip - as you traversed a cut the cutter
would dig deeper into the material. No amount of squeezing on the lock
lever would coerce the router into sticking to the set depth.
3) After only a short time of use my hands were supremely aching by
virtue of the fact that the switch was hard to hold in, and the other
hand was squeezing real hard on the depth lock lever.
4) The dust extraction fitting prevented the router from plunging to
its advertised depth.
5) It was noisy and there was vibration when the router was in
operation - which suggests that either the bearings were crap or that
they were out of alignment.

I was using brand new kitchen worktop bits - I tried a couple of
different bits.

I think there may have been a couple more points which I can't
remember now. Took it back, got a full refund, and purchased a Trend
T9. Now that's what I call a router

You might like to be aware that at the time I took my router back the
exact same rebadged router was for sale in Bracknell town square in a
cut-price store for £39, and they were obviously still able to command
a profit. That PowerPro router appears to have been a rebadged Rolson,
which is a chinese or indian import.

PoP

Sending email to my published email address isn't
guaranteed to reach me.

On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 06:41:27 +0000, Peter wrote:

Anyone got any experience with either of these?

Peter

Don't waste your money on those orange handled chisels !

In article ,
Tony Bryer wrote:
In article , Noel
Hegan wrote:
Just FYI I thought BMJ Power had gone bust?

I collected my fixed B&D drill from the branch in Brentford (behind
PC World) last Saturday and they were very much in business then.
But I couldn't swear it was BMJ: to me it's still the B&D shop.

BMJ power in Chatham certainly shut down with little notice a while
back (there was a thread on here I seem to remember). I rang them at
the start of the week and agreed to take a drill in to be repaired - when
I went on the friday they were closed :-(

Shame. Always had excellent service from them.

Darren

"norm" wrote in message
...
On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 06:41:27 +0000, Peter wrote:

Anyone got any experience with either of these?

Peter

Don't waste your money on those orange handled chisels !

Any comments on the Wicks 30 squid router any one?
1/4 6mm and 8mm (5/16) collets.

Dave