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I see this all the time. Friend of mine bought a $200 Milwaukee drill to put up a couple picture frames.

swader999 5y ago
One of my buddies is a construction guy. He just buys consumer grade with warranty and has two sets of everything. He says pro is too expensive given how often they still break and get stolen on the job site.
p_l 5y ago
At the same time I accidentally bought Bosch Professional cordless drill long time ago. It's biggest problem is that sometimes I forget I have it, then fix what I was doing in few minutes. Also I sometimes forget to charge it, as it holds a charge for years in my practice.
defterGoose 5y ago
Yeah, but you have to be careful with literally any product available at a big box store. My first foray into the Milwaukee brand was their M12 rotary tool and the speed controller broke after about 2-3 total hours of use. Meanwhile my Grandpa's Dremel from the 70s is still chooching along.
kfajdsl 5y ago
My rule of thumb for tools is to always first buy the cheapo Harbor Freight special (I'll get something a little better for precision tools) and if that tool breaks then that means I use the tool enough to justify getting something better. Spoiler alert: most of my tools are the cheapest I could find.
- MonaroVXR 5y ago
  That's a good one and this is what I mostly do.
- snth 5y ago
  I like the idea of this, and I'm sure you save a lot of money, but the downside is this: I want to do some one-off job I haven't done before. It'll be difficult, because I will be trying it for the first time. Do I really want to make it even _more_ difficult by cheaping out on tools? I've done this several times, and I've ended up doing several jobs over again with better tools after I've screwed up the first time. Edit: In other words, cheap tools aren't just less durable, they often do a worse job (or at least make it harder to do a good job).
  - wetpaws 5y ago
    You would want to start with cheapest thing cause usually you don't know how good things you actually need. Using cheep tools gives you a freedom to experiment and know the limitations of the domain area and then invest in things that you exactly need without the risk of overpaying or underpaying, all for a minimum investment.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- dchest 5y ago
  I initially wanted to do the same (needed a drill and a jigsaw for my project, never used them before), but then decided to go with the cheapest Makita which was ~2.5 times more expensive than the cheapest brand, for one reason: safety. For example, the Makita jigsaw had an electric brake (which stops the saw immediately as you release the trigger), while the cheapest tool didn't. Since I didn't have any experience with it, I'd rather not cut my fingers than save some money.

One of my buddies is a construction guy. He just buys consumer grade with warranty and has two sets of everything. He says pro is too expensive given how often they still break and get stolen on the job site.

p_l 5y ago

At the same time I accidentally bought Bosch Professional cordless drill long time ago. It's biggest problem is that sometimes I forget I have it, then fix what I was doing in few minutes. Also I sometimes forget to charge it, as it holds a charge for years in my practice.

defterGoose 5y ago

Yeah, but you have to be careful with literally any product available at a big box store. My first foray into the Milwaukee brand was their M12 rotary tool and the speed controller broke after about 2-3 total hours of use. Meanwhile my Grandpa's Dremel from the 70s is still chooching along.

kfajdsl 5y ago

My rule of thumb for tools is to always first buy the cheapo Harbor Freight special (I'll get something a little better for precision tools) and if that tool breaks then that means I use the tool enough to justify getting something better. Spoiler alert: most of my tools are the cheapest I could find.

MonaroVXR 5y ago
That's a good one and this is what I mostly do.
snth 5y ago
I like the idea of this, and I'm sure you save a lot of money, but the downside is this: I want to do some one-off job I haven't done before. It'll be difficult, because I will be trying it for the first time. Do I really want to make it even _more_ difficult by cheaping out on tools? I've done this several times, and I've ended up doing several jobs over again with better tools after I've screwed up the first time. Edit: In other words, cheap tools aren't just less durable, they often do a worse job (or at least make it harder to do a good job).
- wetpaws 5y ago
  You would want to start with cheapest thing cause usually you don't know how good things you actually need. Using cheep tools gives you a freedom to experiment and know the limitations of the domain area and then invest in things that you exactly need without the risk of overpaying or underpaying, all for a minimum investment.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
dchest 5y ago
I initially wanted to do the same (needed a drill and a jigsaw for my project, never used them before), but then decided to go with the cheapest Makita which was ~2.5 times more expensive than the cheapest brand, for one reason: safety. For example, the Makita jigsaw had an electric brake (which stops the saw immediately as you release the trigger), while the cheapest tool didn't. Since I didn't have any experience with it, I'd rather not cut my fingers than save some money.