Where to get 4.8-9.6v drill cheap

[sanddrag]

I need a cheap 4.8-9.6v drill. It seems like even the Chinese companies have stepped up to making 14.4 and 18V drills.

By cheap, I mean <$12 each.

I have checked:
Home Depot
Pep Boys
Big Lots
Wal Mart
Harbor Freight
Homier
Northern Tool
Froogle
eBay

And none of them have one for the right price. Home Depot's web site lists a Ryobi 7.2v, but you can't buy it online and none of the stores in my area have it.

If anyone knows of any other comparable motor/gearbox combinations for that price, I'm open to suggestions.

[Billfred]

This category would have them. Good luck--if I happen upon anything, I'll edit my post. Unfortunately, some folks seem to love loose interpretations of shipping and handling.

Here's one that, if the bids hold, would go for around $15 shipped to 91226 (which Google says is Glendale, CA).

Here's one for $13ish shipped.

And here's one going for just under $10 right now, with less than a day to go.

Hope this helps!

[ChuckDickerson]

http://www.surpluscomputers.com/stor...&item=TOL10069

They also have a 2 pack for twice the price.

Edit - Ok so the link doesn't seem to work so just go to http://www.surpluscomputers.com and look around for their cordless drills under the tools section or search for TOL10069 Oh yeah, they are 9V and $10 ea.

[sanddrag]

Originally Posted by DeepWater

http://www.surpluscomputers.com/stor...&item=TOL10069

They also have a 2 pack for twice the price.

Edit - Ok so the link doesn't seem to work so just go to http://www.surpluscomputers.com and look around for their cordless drills under the tools section or search for TOL10069 Oh yeah, they are 9V and $10 ea.

Awesome. Their shipping is a little steep but it does still come to less than $15 each. But given that this is all I've (you've, really) found, that's not too bad.

I had some on order from Harbor Freight for $8 each and only $8 shipping for all 4 of them but the order is backordered and they are not for sale anymore which leads me to believe I'll never get them.

Can anyone else find any others?

For ebay, the tricky thing is that I would like 4 identical ones.

[ChuckDickerson]

Good luck with Horror Fright. I have bought lots of stuff from them over the years both online and at the local store about an hour away. If you need cheap tools they are great. Don't expect them to ship anything anytime soon. I bought a display model mill once for $90 that was missing a couple of small parts (handles, etc.). It only took HF a year and a half to ship me the parts. I was in the store last weekend and could have sworn I saw some 9.6V drills. If you want I could run by this weekend and see if they have them in stock. I'll be over that way anyway. If you want me to pick you up some and send them to you just let me know.

You can't use anything higher voltage than 9.6V? You can get 12V drills from HF and Homier for $10. I have heard the Homier one have all metal gears. I have a couple of the HF ones (47155) that I got just to mess with. The first stage has plastic planets but the rest is all metal sun, planets, and ring. If you want me to check anything like measurements or tooth count, etc. on the HF 47155 gearboxes just let me know. I have been thinking about ordering a couple of the $10 12V drills and $13 18V drills from Homier just to see how the gear boxes are built. I suspect that all these cheap Chinese drills are about the same.

As an interesting side note the motor mounts and dimensions in the HF drills I have looked at all have the same 25mm mounting holes as the KoP Fisher Price drills and the weak little Mabushi motor we got in the KoP this year. They are a ready made direct fit if you just pull the pinion off of the motor that comes with the drill and swap it on to the FP/Mabushi motors from the KoP. The gear reduction in the HF 47155 drill is 36:1 IIRC.

[Andy A.]

Originally Posted by DeepWater

As an interesting side note the motor mounts and dimensions in the HF drills I have looked at all have the same 25mm mounting holes as the KoP Fisher Price drills and the weak little Mabushi motor we got in the KoP this year. They are a ready made direct fit if you just pull the pinion off of the motor that comes with the drill and swap it on to the FP/Mabushi motors from the KoP. The gear reduction in the HF 47155 drill is 36:1 IIRC.

Even more interesting, those mounting holes are standered(ish) on hobby style R/C cars, which have lead to interesting results involving FP motors, and later a 14.4 volt drill motor. The odd thing is that at a quick glance, it's near impossible to distinguish a lot of these motors apart. All the cans are pretty much the same, although different enough that I think they only loosely conform to some standards. From what I've come to understand, Mabuchi starting classifying their motors based on their length, in mm's. So you started to have motor designations like 540, 550, etc. R/C car folks started to toss those designations around like engine displacements (even though the numbers have only vague indication on a motors power), and other companies started to market their motors to look and conform to the same sizes. Pretty quickly, a defacto standard arose, since a car could only mount so many different motor sizes, and no one wanted to be left out. After that, this 'standard' kind of bled through to the rest of the small motor world, showing up in FP motors and even drill motors.

So instead of everyone getting down to the table and coming up with a standard, it was more a case of everyone just copying someone else, and we all kind of benefit. At least, thats one explanation. Another is that a motor manufactor is doing the tough job of just winding the motor, and they all buy the can from one or two other manufactors. I guess you would need a plane ticket east and a good understanding of Chinese to get the full story.

Off topic threads are always more fun, no?

-Andy A.

[ChuckDickerson]

Originally Posted by Andy A.

Even more interesting, those mounting holes are standered(ish) on hobby style R/C cars, which have lead to interesting results involving FP motors, and later a 14.4 volt drill motor. The odd thing is that at a quick glance, it's near impossible to distinguish a lot of these motors apart. All the cans are pretty much the same, although different enough that I think they only loosely conform to some standards. From what I've come to understand, Mabuchi starting classifying their motors based on their length, in mm's. So you started to have motor designations like 540, 550, etc. R/C car folks started to toss those designations around like engine displacements (even though the numbers have only vague indication on a motors power), and other companies started to market their motors to look and conform to the same sizes. Pretty quickly, a defacto standard arose, since a car could only mount so many different motor sizes, and no one wanted to be left out. After that, this 'standard' kind of bled through to the rest of the small motor world, showing up in FP motors and even drill motors.

So instead of everyone getting down to the table and coming up with a standard, it was more a case of everyone just copying someone else, and we all kind of benefit. At least, thats one explanation. Another is that a motor manufactor is doing the tough job of just winding the motor, and they all buy the can from one or two other manufactors. I guess you would need a plane ticket east and a good understanding of Chinese to get the full story.

Off topic threads are always more fun, no?

-Andy A.

Interesting. So it seems to be another case of the chicken and the egg. Which came first? The motor or the motor can?