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Great driver for those who drive screws for a living

I build decks for a living and this is my second 1/4 inch Dewalt Impact Driver. I didn’t think I could love a tool more than my first impact driver. Was I wrong! This is absolutely the greatest tool made for people who drive a lot of screws. There is virtually no hand torque compared to using a regular drill-driver, the impact mechanism does all the work for you. Second, the small size and lightweight won’t wear out your arm from a day of driving hundreds of screws. The Nano battery is so light that when I first picked one up, I thought it must be a dislay dummy battery. Dewalt claims this battery has the same work rating as the NiCad battery but it sure seems to last much longer to me. If you drive lots and lots of screws, or just want a very lightweight driver, give this tool serious consideration. Yeah it is pricey, but for dedicated screw driving it can’t be beat.

Some people have complained about the shutdown feature on the Nano battery. The battery shuts down when it reaches a certain discharge level to protect it from being drained too far, which is evidently not good for a lithium battery. I happen to love this feature for a couple reasons. One, it delivers nearly full power right up to shutdown. And as I stated above, this battery seems to last much longer than my NiCad batteries. By shutting down, it makes me avoid something we all do with NiCad when they run down, using the drill like a screwdriver to drive those last couple screws before changing the battery. This practice is very hard on the driver motor. Second, I believe this feature will result in longer battery life with more charge cycles because I will be charging the battery at the same level each time. One of the reasons for premature NiCad battery failure is inconsistent charging cycles, i.e. charging it when half dead one time and completely dead the next.

As for the fit of the new battery on older tools, who cares what it looks like? I don’t want Dewalt making a battery bigger and heavier just for cosmetic reasons. I am glad this new Nano battery is more compact. I use my tools daily and size matters, the smaller and lighter the better.

Update (2/7/2012): This item is currently on sale here for the lowest price I’ve seen. I also found some auctions for this item here.

The featured review for this product, DEWALT DC827KL 18-Volt 1/4-inch Lithium Ion Impact Driver Kit with NANO Technology Tools & Hardware, was written by James T.

The average rating for this item is 5 out of 5 stars, according to 3 reviews.