Shit, my man, ever since Craftsman stopped really being Craftsman, all bets are off.
In case anyone is curious, the Lifetime Warranty on Craftsman hand tools is still in effect. You need to walk into a Lowe’s with your broken ratchet, now, but they’ll still swap you another one for free. It just hurts a little trading in your 20-year-old Craftsman ratchet, which is lighter, better built, and shows attention to detail, for a lump of Chinesium that’s just bluntly stamped also-ran stuff. Definitely a downgrade. But the warranty is still there, so that’s something.
Now, shit, who knows? My stuff is still mostly Craftsman, but stuff has been replaced with lesser brands as it fails or gets lost, it’s whatever, now, for hand tools.
I’ve heard good things about Makita, lately. Make sure you follow TorqueTestChannel on Youtube for the real man news, they’ve got a whole setup for testing power tools to see if they’re worth the price.
Yeah, they may not last my whole life but neither is anything else with a battery. I don’t put enough strain on the tools I use around the house to break them.
I think Ryobi is perfect for as an entry tool. If you break it from overuse, then buy a high quality product. But if it’s the first time buying a tool where you don’t know how often you will use it, Ryobi is perfectly fine to get started with and fmailiarize yourself with it.
I agree. to add both 18 and 40v are have high and low quality feeling devices. The high quality lawn mower and hand held yard tools are good enough. get big batteries. Have enough to keep going with an ulta fast charger. the hybrid 18v are my jam. Plastic weld is great for fixing their plastic. battery warranty is pretty good.
As of now I only have two drills and a measuring tape from them (I know Makita from working dry construction during college). I think it’s really hard to cut off an arm with those :D
Makita all the way. I was first introduced to it by a neighbor who had a Makita drill, and it was so much better than the generic one I had previously. Now I own a bunch of 18V Makita tools, from your standard power drill, an impact drill, air compressor, a lawnmower, weed trimmer, and hedge trimmer.
I’m locked into the brand now, but I have zero regrets as their tools are very high quality. Nope I wanna get some woodworking tools but don’t have the space for a proper workbench lol.
A lot of people are commenting about how Ryobi and Milwaukee are owned by the same parent company.
This is true, but in the same way Lexus and Toyota are the same company. Ryobi is intro level and Milwaukee is the professional focused brand. There’s nothing wrong with Ryobi, but Project Farm has repeatedly tested Milwaukee and Ryobi and Milwaukee consistently outperforms. It’s not a "badge engineering"situation.
That’s how they got me as well. Lowest priced plus on sale. Reviews were mostly fine for the trimmer itself. Most people seemed to have more issues with the customer service, which, that’s pretty standard for many companies these days. I was tired of constantly having to fix the name brand gas weed eater I had, so I picked up one of the battery powered Ryobi models. It works…fine lol. Battery could last longer. Otherwise it does exactly what it says it does on the box. I’ve never had a problem with it. My other handful of Ryobi tools are in that camp. Kinda cheap feeling but seem to work as advertised.
The only one that was shit is the drill. I have a low-end black and decker drill that has lasted me about ten years. The Ryobi I got maybe hit three.
I’ll tell you though, the best tool I own is my Scott manual push mower. Picked it up for $99 and I’ve never had an issues and it still cuts like it did when I bought it four years ago. A little WD40 in the spring after pulling it out of shed hibernation and off to cut.
I always heard “buy a cheap tool and if it breaks buy better version” - haven’t really done enough to go thru any ryobis yet, except for leaving batteries out in the garage all winter.
Ryobi for the lightweight, didn’t need but didn’t want to rent stuff. My landscape gear is one+ and works perfectly for my needs so having the battery platform makes things easier.
I guess it’s an endorsement when no one really has anything bad to say about them. We all just go “meh, there are better options if you’ve got the cash”.
Ryobi is a great toolset overall. Even light woodworking is perfectly fine. I have maybe 8ish of their tools, ranging from drill to lawnmower and the only one I’d have any real issues with is my table saw.
