Milwaukee Sawzalls

One item Milwaukee Tools is best known for is the Sawzall. While that's a trademarked term, other manufacturers also make them (going by the name recip saws, which is short for reciprocating saws). But what is really interesting to me is the number of models that Milwaukee makes of this type of tool. But what is the reason for making so many unique SKUs of sawzall? I'll examine the top selling models a little closer today to show what the main differences are.

Saws of interest

The models I'll be looking at today are the 6536-21 13 amp Super Sawzall, 6523-21 360° Rotating Handle Super Sawzall, 6519-22 10 amp Sawzall, 6509-22 10 amp Sawzall, and the 6509-20 10 amp sawzall.

First things first - Amps

The first thing that people usually look at with a Sawzall is the amp rating. Of these, 3 are 10 amp and 2 are 13 amp. But what does that mean? Most people think that the amp rating states how much power the tool has, but that's not necessarily the case. Matt already wrote about this, so I'll just quote his blog entry on the topic.

You know that amp rating that so many consumers use to determine how much {insert manly growl} power a tool has? It really means very little. The rating process is kind of silly. The testing labs get a tool from a manufacturer and are told "We would like to be rated for 12.0 amps". The testing lab then puts heat sensors in certain areas of the tool, and then apply the requested current to the tool... as long as the sensors do not get above a set temperature in a set amount of time, then the lab says "Hey this is a 12.0 amp tool!"

Thanks, Matt. So now that we know that amps aren't that much of a difference, what should we look at now?

Price

Price seems like something that most people would be at least somewhat interested in. Arranging these by price, we get a range from about $109 to $189. That order looks like 6509-20, 6509-22, 6519-22, 6536-21 and 6523-21 is the highest. But that doesn't really tell us what the differences are yet, now does it?

Cases

One thing that can be noticed by looking at the "Standard Equipment" on each of these tools is that the 6536-21, 6523-21, and the 6509-22 all come with a carrying case. The 6519-22 and the 6509-20 do not. In fact, the only difference between the 6509-20 and the 6509-22 is the case. For $10, it seems that many people don't want the case. Choose wisely.

Stroke Length

One of the actual differences is the stroke length. The 6509 models are 3/4" stroke, the 6519 is 1-1/8", and the 6536 and 6523 are 1-1/4" stroke lengths. What that means is the in-and-out motion is 3/4" to 1-1/4" depending on model, which leads to the ability to cut smaller / larger materials easier. For most jobs, the longer stroke length is actually a plus. If you're cutting into a wall and don't want to poke out the other side or cut hidden wires, you may want the shorter stroke. That's just something you'll need to decide.

Orbital Action

If you've used a sawzall much at all, you'll quickly find out if it has orbital action or not. When cutting wood, orbital movement allows for the cutting motion to move a bit front-to-back, which allows the sawdust to fall from the material being cut. This speeds up cutting and adds to the life of the blade. The 6509's and 6519 don't have orbital action, while the 6536 and the 6523 include this feature.

Cord Type

On the 6509 and 6536, Milwaukee uses a fixed cord. Most people prefer the Quik-lok cord available on the 6519 and 6523 models. This makes it possible to replace a cut / frayed cord without opening the tool - even at the jobsite. As with any saw, the cord can easily be cut by accident, so this is a nice feature if you'll be using the saw quite a bit.

Keyless Blade Clamps and Shoes

All of these models have a keyless blade clamp. All of the models except the 6509 also include a keyless shoe adjustment. Since most people don't even know what the shoe is for, that probably doesn't make much of a difference. If you're one of the people that understands it (hint: it allows you to use other segments of the blade), then the keyless is a nice feature to look for.

Rotating Handle

The 6523-21, while it has all of the nice features listed above, also goes one step further. It also includes a rotating handle. This is designed to make the sawzall even more versatile by allowing the handle to rotate and lock at 45° increments. It can even rotate all the way around without going back to the starting position. That's just dandy, but why would you want that? Simple - flexibility. If you're cutting and want to go right-to-left instead of top-to-bottom, rotating the handle makes that much more comfortable. It also helps keep that pesky cord out of the way when cutting in cramped areas.

V28 Cordless

While these are all electric, It'd be silly not to point out that Milwaukee also offers their V28 Cordless Sawzall for those that just can't cope with a cord all the time. I personally prefer the idea of cordless, but it's a much higher pricepoint if you're not going to be using it very often. For a couple hundred dollars less, that 6523-21 looks awfully nice to me.

Is that a V28 Engine under the hood? Milwaukee Li-Ion Chevy Bel-Air

The "Red Line" tour came to our place today. This included the Monster Garage built V28 powered car. Not only is this thing cool to look at, it's also pretty darn quick - getting up to almost 100 mph in the quarter mile. It runs from 384 of Milwaukee's V28 Li-Ion batteries and drew quite a bit of attention (yes, that's almost $50k and 900 lbs of "fuel" for those keeping score at home, not including the 210 V28 chargers). I'm sure that seems like a decent chunk of cash to most of us, but our rep stated that getting this car built cost them $275k, so it's not all that much in comparison.

Now that you know what powers this beast, allow me show you some of the details of this interesting rechargeable automobile.

Stock looking interior

As you can see, the inside is fairly "standard". Nothing overly impressive, other than it looks great for being a 1962 vehicle. Milwaukee had it done in their black and red color scheme with some white highlights, but it still looks pretty stock. It wasn't perfect, but it was also done pretty quickly for the show and wasn't what they were really concerned with. They did, after all, just want to make something that went fast down the 1/4 mile track, and 93 mph in 14.5 seconds isn't too bad for a power tool battery powered car.

Interesting accellerator

If you look really close (clicking on the image to zoom in a bit helps), the gas pedal is actually like those used on boats for trolling motors. I found that a bit amusing that they ended up using one of those, but it is understandable since they're running electric motors with it and not moving a lever to open up the carb letting more fuel and air in. I hadn't ever really thought about what they would use for an accellerator, which is probably why it stood out as much as it did to me. Either way, the feel was a bit different and I thought it was worth noting. The wire coming off of it will be re-run at some point, but for now it's functional.


Stock from the front

From the front, this car looks fairly stock as well. Nothing really screams "electric muscle car" from the outside. Come to think of it, electric muscle car is sort of an odd term. The other phrase I heard to describe this is "High-tech classic". That didn't really make much sense either. An electric car shouldn't be considered a classic if you ask me, regardless how old the body style is. But I would have to agree that it's sweet technology, as would most any classic car enthusiast. I'd still prefer a V8 over a V28, but that wouldn't help with Milwaukee's marketing like this does.

Sweet wheels

The wheels that they chose looked pretty nice as well. I like the Milwaukee logo sweeping across the fender, even if some of the paint had already decided to bubble and start peeling. But hey - it's a classic car body that's been on the road being shown at tool stores around the country, so you can't expect it to be perfect. It's still plenty shiny, and those low-profile tires look nice. I'm just glad I didn't have to mount them on the rims. That would have been a real pain in the back-end. I guess that's why I decided to be a geek and not a tire changer for a career.

Under the hood

Now that you've seen the outside, it's time to take a peek under the hood. Being an electric, it looks quite different. No gas lines, just electrical wires. No oil dipsticks, no air filters, just solenoids and fuses. But since it's a newer technology, it's pretty neat to look at. I think it's cool that a car can run that fast and be almost completely quiet, void of the typical rumble of exhaust pipes. Obviously, if it were a commercial vehicle it would have the wires hidden a bit more, but it's not so it was just made to be functional and semi-pretty to look at. I'll include a few more pictures below from under the hood, just because it's neat.




In this last "motor" picture, notice how fire was hand drawn coming from one of the monsters. Sort of a neat touch.


The Fuel

As you can see from the underside, there is no gas tank. Why would anyone need a gas tank on an electric car? Some of the straps for transportation are still draped over the rear end and sway bar (was that supposed to go there - the bar now looks bent), and you can see that the power cables aren't actually hooked up. At the top of the picture, you can see that the trunk was wood lined, which allowed for easy mounting of the battery receptacles. No, there weren't 384 batteries installed, but looking up it was easy to see where they all went.

Battery mounting system

To the left is the view from under the trunk. For whatever reason, they couldn't get the trunk to open, but from the underside all of the battery positions were visible. I was a little shocked to see rust on the underside of the trunk, but it is a '62 Bel-Air body with 43 year newer battery technology - and it shows in areas. The car is still sweet, but it isn't immaculate like I was expecting. In their defense, they did put it together in 4 days and have it scheduled to go in for a complete refinishing (body / interior) after this week. We're one of the last stops to get to see the Monster Garage's original work.

It was an interesting distration from our usual power tool workplace. Given a few more of these events, my blog won't even have to talk about power tools - just the publicity stunts that the manufacturers are trying. But until we get to that point, I'll be going back to Power Tool blogging for a while... except for an upcoming Milwaukee Chopper post.

Li-Ion Tool Sales History - Canada

With Li-Ion tools being out in North America for over a year now I think its time to take a look back and see how it went. What has been selling well, and what has not.

Disclaimer

First a disclaimer, this article by no means is reflecting on the actual quality of any of the products, just the sale history in my geographical area (West Coast Canada, Vancouver Area). I fully realize that other geographical areas may have completely different sales track records, which I would find very interesting to look at also. In fact, I would love to hear some of Brian's comments on how things are going in his part of the world.

History

First a little history. As we all know, Milwaukee Power Tools was the the first to introduce Lithium Ion Technology in North America with their V28 line, and they did so with a big splash. However, they had a very hard time keeping production up with the demand of the product because they couldn't make the batteries fast enough. What happened then is America gobbled up all the available product for about the first 8 months, which meant Milwaukee Canada simply had no units available for the northern distributors.

Product Arrival

By the time we finally got Milwaukee Li-Ion Products, Makita LXT showed up that same week, which was early January 2006. We made a very impressive display for both, having them side by side. On one side we had the larger, more powerful, more expensive 28v Milwaukee tools, and on the other side we had the more ergonomic, lighter, compact and less expensive 18v Makita tools.

Outcome

What happened? Makita 18v Li-Ion so far has completely out sold the Milwaukee 28v tools to the point where our stores will no longer be stocking the 28v series on a regular basis. It seemed the paying customer preferred less expensive lightweight ergonomic tools over the impressive brute power of the bigger tools.

More Choices

When the Bosch 10.8v pocket drivers arrived they to had very good response. The first 50 we got lasted barely a month. Dewalt 36v arrived shortly afterward, and has had very moderate positive response so far.

Current Trends

Right now, it looks like the consumer is leaning towards lighter, compact tools over the big heavy power houses. Milwaukee and Hitachi 18v Li-Ion has also just arrived into stock, but haven't been around here long enough to analyze the demand for them. I would like to know how other areas are responding to the Li-Ion tools. If anyone has information on the subject I would like to hear about it.

Article submitted by Chris of KMS Tools.

New V28 Tools Coming Soon!

Our Milwaukee rep was in again today, and he let me know that there are some new V28 tools on the way. Four to be exact.

1) 1" Rotary Hammer
How cool is this? A cordless SDS-Plus rotary hammer! Just what I've never needed. Then again, I've never needed a rotary hammer anyway. If I did, cordless would sure be a nice option. These should be cool for demolition crews like Matt used to work on.

2) Right-Angle Drill
There are a lot of times that I've thought a right-angle would be nice to have. I'm glad they're changing this one over. Milwaukee has always made nice right angle drills, so this could be a huge seller for them.

3) Metal Cutting Saw
I wasn't exactly sure what the difference between a regular circular saw and a metal cutting circular saw was, so I asked. It seems that a metal cutting circular saw has a housing to collect metal shavings and runs at a different RPM. A regular circular saw with a metal blade will send metal shavings at the user, so it's more fun to watch from a safe distance, but much lower on the safety ratings.

4) Jobsite Radio
The Milwaukee radios have always sounded nice with their Rockford Fosgate speakers. By having V28 power, they should be able to bump up the wattage and really have a good sound to them. It may seem ho-hum to most people, but I'm thinking the sound could be almost to the point of good on these, unlike most jobsite radios that are more on the "I can live with it" level. I guess we'll know soon enough. The official statement from their website is "With up to 44 watts of total system power and upgraded amplifier and speakers, this unit will accept 12 to 18 volt Ni-Cd and V18 to V28 Li-Ion Milwaukee battery packs. Under V28 power, the unit will run 50 percent longer." Sweet music to my ears.

More on the way in the not-so-distant future
He also assured us that, among others, the V28 powered jobsite microwave was still going to be coming out in the near future. That'll be the fun one. I'm going to see if we can make him use a cordless microwave to make TV dinners and microwave popcorn for everyone here when they get released. Fun for the whole family!

V28 Jobsite Microwaves?

Yes, I said V28 Microwaves. Our Milwaukee rep is so pumped about the future widening of the Milwaukee cordless line that he's predicting things as wild as jobsite microwaves, outdoor power equipment, table saws, miter saws, bench grinders - you name it, they're looking at making it cordless. I suppose that any company that is crazy enough to make a cordless tool battery powered car that runs 100MPH in the 1/4 mile is bound to come up with some oddball products with their cordless line, and it should be exciting seeing the races as the other manufacturers try to keep up in making everything cordless.

I'm looking for comments on the craziest cordless tool concept.

A cordless jackhammer comes to mind.

Cordless concrete saw? Could be possible.

Cordless drywall lighting system? Sure, why not?

How about a V28 powered electrical generator? (Actually, that was something our rep threw out, so it may not be so crazy.)

V28 powered charger for an 18V battery? Ok, that's just silly.

How about a V28 powered forklift?

What can you imagine?

Milwaukee V28 Price Drops and Free Tools!

Milwaukee has given us the green light on some price drops on the V28 line of tools. Now that stock levels are where they need to be to keep us supplied, we dropped the prices to make them more attractive. I'm not sure if it is coincidence with the recent article in The Journal of Light Construction that Milwaukee placed on their site or not, but the timing seemed a little suspicious.

Ripe for the picking
Couple the price drops with the fact that Milwaukee has an aggressive rebate program right now where you get your choice of another V28 tool (tool only, no extra batteries, charger or case) by mail when you buy any of the individual tools and they're ripe for the picking. I've been sticking with my Makita 18V kit, but this really has me thinking.

Power to spare
I've been wanting to get a cordless impact for a while. Of couse, I already mentioned how much power the Milwaukee model has. But when I can get a porta-band and the impact for the price of a porta-band, it gets more tempting. I know I don't need that much power, but Makita doesn't make one that'll work with my 18V batteries anyway and I can't justify moving up to the LXT Lithium-Ion models when I have so many of the 18V Ni-MH models (and batteries) already.

Lead me not into temptation
There's no need to lead me into temptation. I can find it myself, thanks. So why hast thou forsaken me, Milwaukee? I hear the call of the wild, and it says buy one so I can get one. It's just not fair. Please, Milwaukee, hide these offers from me in the future.

Milwaukee V28 Impact selling point?

When the V28 line of Milwaukee cordless tools first came out, we had a customer come in and wanted to see if the impact had enough power for the lugnuts on his brand new dually. It's listed as 325 ft-lbs of torque, but what does that mean when you're using it? We had a battery charged up, so we took it to the parking lot to see what it would do.

Removed the lug
It removed the lug nut just fine. No problems at all there. In fact, it didn't even seem to think twice about this simple task. The V28's have more than enough power for pulling off a lug nut.

Installed the lug
It didn't have any problems when installing the lug, either. It tightened it up in no time flat, and it gave a couple of clicks so we knew it was tight. That was the point he should have stopped.

One more time
The customer pulled the trigger once more - just to make sure it was tight enough. Well, that was one time too many. He managed to shear off the stud with that little pull of the trigger.

Bought the tool
He was impressed with that, and bought it immediately. He didn't need any more proof that it had some power. The funny part is that relating that story to people in the store, many immediately say "That's the one I need then".

How much is too much?
That brings up the question - how much is too much? I don't personally need to shear the studs off of the wheels of my father's Jeep to know if something has enough power to put a lug nut on or not. I don't need the most powerful tool on the market. The jobs I do never require the biggest, baddest, meanest tool in existence. I'm usually just driving a screw, setting an anchor, or changing a tire. Even some of the much lower voltage tools can handle those jobs without much effort. But, being Americans, we feel inclined to buy too much instead of what may only do what we need. I'm sure someone will come out with a 350, 400 or even 500 ft-lb impact at some point, but what's the use if it breaks everything you're trying to assemble?

Getting a longer runtime for my cordless blower

There is an upcoming product announcement from one of our manufacturers which Matt has mentioned in his article "It's time to put your favorite tools on Lituium (ion)". No specifics yet, but you can probably guess who and what the announcement will be without all the details or specifics. At first, this seemed sort of like just a geeky thing to do to me. Changing battery technologies is cool and all, but for an IT guy how useful would that really be? Well, I'm having trouble deciding.

High Drain Applications
Obviously, longer runtime is a big deal for high current applications. If you only use a cordless flashlight there's not a real reason to switch, unless you're in Alaska and have those 24 hour nights and no charger. Ok, so you'll have to consider it twice there too with the charging problems with cold weather. But when you've got a geeky tool like the Makita UB181DZ which boasts a whopping 9 minute runtime, Lithium Ion may become a HUGE deal. Even if it only doubles the runtime, I could probably get all the grass clippings off of my driveway without swapping batteries.

Fewer Batteries
Right now, I have 4 batteries for my tools. I typically have to use 2 fully charged batteries for blowing off the driveway, sidewalk and patio. I have one always on my flashlight and one is usually in my drill. Being able to do the same amount of work with fewer batteries is cool on the geek meter, but is it truly practical?

Tough Choice
I'll probably get one for the blower and eventually have fewer batteries when some of my current ones start to die. By then, I should know what makes sense - longer runtime or more batteries. Once I have it figured out, I'll let you know what I decided.

The delimma is this: sometimes it's handy to have more batteries, but other times I'd love the longer runtime. I guess it comes down to how many tools do I want ready to go... and how much of an inconvenience it is to swap the batteries back and forth. That means it is subjective and it comes down to personal preference, so there is no right answer.