Bosch Litheon Tools - Current and Planned

In part two of my series on Lithoen, I'm going to take a look at the tools they're offering and planning. Of course, more will be offered as time progresses.

Superior Power to Weight Ratio
Of course, the big thing is the power-to-weight ratio. That was covered in more depth here, but it's worth mentioning again as they describe this for each power level, especially when looking back to the questions I posed in the last article about comparing 36V to 18V.

10.8V Litheon Tools
By taking advantage of the higher energy density, Bosch says that the 10.8V Litheon can provide the power of a nickel-based battery at a fraction of the weight. Of course, it doesn't say the voltage, but their next statement, when combined with the previous link, says they think 18V. They say Litheon can also provide double the power at equal weight in 36V. Sort of makes you wonder why 36V is only double that of 10.8 since they implied that 18V didn't gain anything over 18V Ni-Cd.

I'd also point out that Bosch shows that the 10.8V Litheon tools get a 70% charge in just 15 minutes. That's absolutely amazing and it should make it much easier to have some power when you need it, even if the battery goes dead. Just do something else while you wait a few minutes to charge it some... very cool.

Current 10.8V Litheon Tools
The current tools are the I-Driver and the Pocket Driver. What's very interesting here is the fact that they show no other planned tools on this page, although there's got to be something. They don't normally create a line of batteries for just 2 tools, so I guess we'll wait and see what else comes out.

The I-Driver is a very versatile little device with it's pivoting head and narrow profile. I anticipate this being a very useful tool down the road, with better adoption if more 10.8V tools get introduced.

The pocket driver is also incredibly useful. At half the size of a 12V compact driver, it's just really small yet powerful, which makes it incredibly useful. Some of the comments on a previous post make it apparent just how much people like and want this one. Again, more 10.8V tools will help justify the batteries, but this one seems to be a hit anyway.


36V Litheon Tools
Not to be outdone in power, the 36V line is offering not only as much power as many corded tools, but in some cases they'll be promoting cordless tools with more power than their corded lines. It seems silly, but they really want to push this new technology. Also, the 36V batteries will get 80% charge in just 24 minues. That's another huge win for high voltage.


Current 36V Tools
At this time, they have one tool in the 36V line that is available for purchase in the US. It's a 36V 1" rotary hammer. The design is decent, the balance didn't seem too bad, and 9.6lbs isn't terrible. This is one of the tools they claim has more power than a "Yellow" corded model. I'm not going to touch that claim, but it's certainly interesting.

Future 36V Tools
Coming soon, they show a 36V Hammerdrill / Driver, a 36V Drill / Driver, a 36V Reciprocating Saw and a 36V Circular Saw. Those all seem like great choices for making powerful, but will it be more power than needed at the expense of weight and battery size? I guess we'll have to wait and see, but I will say that it all looks pretty promising.