I can use a corded line trimmer along my entire property perimeter so there’s no location I couldn’t reach with a corded drill or anything else that needs juice. Other people’s needs may differ based on property size and layout (I have a detached garage set back from the house so can just plug into there).
I have a few different Ryobi tools, so the batteries I have get a lot of use. And since one of those tools is a lawn mower, the batteries are always charged. And they hold their charge for quite a while. I have a fairly small yard, so it takes a good month and a half to kill of a battery. The spare one is always fully charged and ready to go. Plus, the charger has some kind of meter on it that stops charging when the battery is full, so you could technically leave it on the charger 24/7.
I posted earlier in jest, but the reality is, the idea of stringing out and rewinding extension cords is not something I enjoy doing.
I used to have a corded Nakita drill. I sold it a few years ago because I never used it. And if you want me to completely honest, most of the time, the idea of pulling it out and using it was so unappealing that I just used a manual screwdriver.
The irony in all of this is that the drill I use is actually from a brand called Channel Lock. I won it in a company event a few years back, and I’ve been extremely impressed with it. Before that, I went through three Black and Decker drills in about 18 months. The battery still works. The drill kept burning out.
Many years ago, my faithful two-cycle Lawn Boy stopped working after who knows how many decades, and the government was offering an incentive program for people to trade in their gas lawn mowers for electric ones. I bought the cheapest corded electric mower I could find, which under the terms of the program was practically free. God, how I hated that thing. I thought the cord would be a minor nuisance but worth the cost savings, but it turned out to be a very major PITA in every way imaginable. My current solution is to pay a kid to mow my lawn, with his own high-powered mower.
I couldn’t agree more about the cord. My first electric mower had a cord. It was far more of a nuisance than it was worth. But the battery operated one was a game changer. No more trips to the gas station. No more oil changes. Oh, and I can mow at 5:00 AM when it’s still cool out without the neighbors complaining!
There is a limit, though, to how large your lawn can be before it becomes impractical. I have a co-worker who has the same mower with a much, much bigger yard. The mower came with two batteries, and he needed to buy a third. When he mows, he uses all three, and the first one has just enough recharge to finish. He’s not nearly as happy with the mower as I am.
I have a corded snowblower that was cheap. I joke that the 50’ heavy duty extension cord cost more than the snowblower did. It’s a pain in the ass since you’re making passes back and forth so have to keep moving the cord to be out of your path or else risk chewing it up into the machine. Halfway down the driveway, I have to disconnect from the garage outlet and plug it into the house by the door because the driveway is twice as long as the cord. But it still beats the hell out of shoveling in time & effort and we haven’t gotten enough snow in recent years to warrant buying a battery-powered model.
Battery-powered lawn mowers are like electric cars – they’re great in most applications, but there are use cases where gas is still best. The nice thing about cordless drills is that their power requirements are low enough that they’re just as good as the best corded ones in just about any application.
I have a similar solution to that as to my lawn mowing problem, except in the winter instead of paying Lawn Mower Kid, I pay Snowplow Guy. I also have Ukrainian Handyman Brothers on speed dial. Not that I can afford such an army of servants, but I tell myself that I’m sufficiently old and feeble that I have no choice! 
I suggest choosing a Makita, Dewalt or Milwaukee product from a local tool dealer. Home Depot and other box stores tend to carry very slightly downtuned versions of the same models, usually with a different letter on the end of the model number.
As a construction guy I can tell you that Makita is still a major brand and generally considered as slightly higher quality and often better design and balance than DeWalt. Most carpenters I know still use Makita rather than DeWalt. Largely though, Makita, Dewalt and Milwaukee are on par. Each have specific tool models that stand out a little from the others.
Hilti, Fein, Festool, etc are a step up in quality or duty level.
When I used to work more with tradespeople Festool was considered the best if you were doing carpentry or high end wood working. Hilti if you’re doing concrete work; their hand drills were considered worse than Makita/Milwaukee/Dewalt.
Agree.
I bought our daughter a Milwaukee battery-powered push mower after she bought her house. That mower works great on her yard, and it is really powerful (it takes two battery packs). I recall it was pretty expensive, though.
Electric for our yard? No way. It takes me 3 hours to cut it with a 54" ZRT w/ gas engine.
There are some riding mowers that are electric, but stupidly-expensive IMO.
My corded drills have none of those antiquated features and have been that way for decades now. Chuck keys would be truly a weird blast from the past. Don’t know if the American market is just very different, though.
I guess it’s mostly the Chinese low-end stuff that’s on Amazon - they are typically made the same for 40 years or so, as it’s the cheapest possible way to go.
I can’t imagine a corded mower. Oh. My. God.
After not mowing 33 years, my new has a yard. 1/3 acre. But of course with the house and garages and patio, it’s not a full 1/3 acre of grass. I bought an E-Go cordless mower, string trimmer, and blower. Because of special deals, I ended up with 5 batteries, and three chargers. Everything is interchangeable, So I never runout of ‘juice’.
That 18 minutes claim, I’m calling BS. It might be true, because you probably have a lot of people who have no desire to do any work around the house, and get a drill for some reason. Possibly as a gift. I know some people who will literally call a handyman to hang a picture- and I’m not exaggerating. So sure, you average in a lot of zeros, but they aren’t representative of the people who actually DO use tools.
I have let the smoke out of three cordless drills at this point, all from pushing them too hard.
I[quote=“OldOlds, post:72, topic:1020380, full:true”]
That 18 minutes claim, I’m calling BS.
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I think the saying is much like the old saying that there are only a few minutes of action in a game of football. It’s more to illustrate how little time is actually spent drilling.
I had to hang a new closet door a few days ago. Backing out six screws, drilling new holes for nine new ones, and putting in those nine screws. Through the course of the project, the actual drill was actually running maybe a minute.
Does the average homeowner have 18 of those projects in a lifetime?
It might be yet another example of a population where a mathematical average is misleading. Perhaps a more useful stat for this would be the median number of minutes.
You said it better than I did. Agree.
May be useless, but I’ll mention:
Prime Day sale at 50% off. Should be near enough to your price range and considering the two batteries (if you’re not using the impact driver) and charger, you could probably do worse.
Of course, this makes me feel like a dirty Amazon shill, so feel free to boo me.
Damn, that’s an awesome deal. I already have these, but I just placed an order for it. Maybe I’ll give it to our son as a gift.
Thanks all for your thoughts. Being the one who fixes things around the house, I am well above the average someone quoted (which seems crazy low to me). I’m probably going with a Milwaukee brand.