I found a set of Makita tools for 60% off last year and now I'm Makita battery dependent for the rest of my life

Feels like something the EU would eventually work on settling: making all tool manufacturers have a non-proprietary connector.

More people should know there actually are adapters for different brands of batteries on amazon, and thingiverse if you have a 3D printer

Yeah Ryobi is dirt cheap and good enough for most things. When you need to add another tool, choosing between the one that doesn’t have a battery and the one that does but is twice the price has a big influence on your decision.

Also, I’m not a contractor, so I only use certain tools once every six months. Have yet to have anything fail on me. If it does, maybe I’ll upgrade. Certain tools have already paid for themselves in that they saved me from needing to hire someone else. Just getting a pole saw and hedge trimmer alone saved me probably $700.

I do have a few of the other brands, but they were damn pricey and I don’t use them enough to justify it.

Fucking Ridgid got me, because on paper, they have lifetime warranties on their batteries. But after buying an expensive combo, they made it an absolute hassle to register my tools, so I kinda doubt they'll honor their warranty. Now I'm Ridgid + Dewalt. My corded tools and hand tools are whatever brand; harbor freight or walmart if not used often, Milwaukee, DeWalt, etc if I expect to use them often.

I really dislike Home Depot after a series of huge customer service mishaps with me last year, and actively avoid going there now.

Which is a shame because I have a lot of Ryobi One tools. They are perfectly positioned for weekend warriors…huge tool library, good batteries, affordable and of fairly decent quality (certainly well above “junk” and a good value for the money).

Shame that is a store-exclusive brand.

The worst part is I’ve bought into most of the cordless tools I’d really need. The day might come where I want a larger circular saw (mines only 5.5 and it is prone to binding if your technique isn’t perfect, and even then…) or find that some of the tools that I’m okay with having corded (like a jigsaw or an angle grinder) I now need a cordless replacement. At that point I’ll likely find myself buying into a better and more expensive battery system and, for quite a while, only having the one seldom-used tool for it.

Now I’ve got a dead 4Ah battery and I’m on the fence as to rebuild it, buy a new one, or take it as an opportunity to start going into a new battery system.

It is whatever you buy a battery and charger for first. Then you are unwilling to forfeit that battery to just buy another too

One could go pneumatic, get a compressor and pneumatic tools.

Milwaukee included a bag and floodlight in their drill package so I guess that did it for me. Most of my drill bits are Ryobi though.

(Not a dad, just a lesbian)

Would there be a way to 3D print plastic part of a battery and just fill it with standard battery types (cylindrical batteries) and make them swapable? Because as far as i know there isn't really any electronics in batteries, just different voltages based on number of batteries in series and different mounting mechanism. It just seems like a silly vendor lock-in.

I actually did a lot of research on this when I bought my first battery tools, knowing this would be the case, and decided they had a decent range of everything I'd likely need.

I went with AEG.