Bosch 10.8v Who uses them?

[Bradshaw Joinery]

I bought a set of 5 tools and three batteries in September 2011, And i haved love the tools every time i have used them, the drill is very powerful and light, the torch was bright, impact fantastic, batteries lasted well, saw is sooooo handy etc etc... so you can imagine my shock when within one week, i had a dead battery, the torch broke, the saw turned on but immediately off (intermittent) and the drill driver has an intermittent trigger...(Very annoying)..... Just out of the warranty, and i didnt do the 3yr register.... DOH.

So has anyone else used these drills for a similar period/longer and seen similar issues? all three brakdowns seem to be loose connections as they work fine at times, but fail to work at all sometimes.

 

[Heath Robinson]

I've had mine (drill and impact) about 18months, and even after dropping them, covering the impact in cut concrete slurry, and generally not looking after them very well, they're both perfect.
I have found that the charger, however, ruins any digital radio signal within about 40ft!
Great little tools though.

 

[ColeyS1]

Ive had no problems as such. Occasionally when its real cold the triggers have to be pressed a few times before it works. I find im using the 18 volt drills less and less now

 

[Bradshaw Joinery]

Second that coley, i hardly use any other drills now..... Hopefully the repair service is reasonable.

 

[Richard S]

I had a heating engineer in just before Xmas and in the course of a conversation about tools in general he told me that he is issued with Bosch 10 .8 drills and that he gets through one a year, says it is always the trigger that gives out. He just hands his back and draws a new one from stores but if this is correct and it is a known fault it may be worth talking to Bosch. I would also say that as they offer a three year warranty only requiring registration that is tacit acceptance that the tools should last that long, current sales of goods legislation takes no account of warranties instead insisting that goods should last a reasonable time with relation to type and cost. You can argue that a premium brand, premium priced product should last more than a year.
Incidentally I have had mine for about four years and its been perfect
Good luck
Richard

 

[Dodge]

Had one of my 10.8v drills for about 3 years now since they were first sold, still on the original batteries and working brilliantly and gets very heavy daily use in my workshop. Batteries still holding their charge like new.

Also have had one of the newer models of drill for about 18 months and again cannot fault it.

 

[Eric The Viking]

I've got three of them - drill, oscillating saw/sander and impact driver. I've had the first two for a couple of years and I've got three batteries. They're all lasting pretty well, in fact "exercise" seems to improve the battery capacity.

My only two gripes: The drill has too much slop compared to older ones, and the battery indicator on the saw broke early on (but it doesn't matter).

The charger might well be illegal under EU regs. It shouldn't emit RFI as it does, and although It's the second thing I've bought that does that, it's by far the worst. The other was a cheap digital 'picture frame', which needed an earthed screen round the plug-in power supply to stop it.

In this case, that's impractical because of the air cooling of the charger, but most of it seems to get out via the mains cable, and I think I've stopped the worst of it on mine with a big ferrite ring on the lead, at the charger end. Downside: this shortens the lead a lot (and you need to wind the lead round the ferrite in the correct way).

I took mine apart to investigate why - there should be some sort of RF-blocking filter right next to the cable on the mains input, but there isn't (as far as I can see). It's so noisy, I doubt the clip-on variety of RF choke (that you see on computer monitor cables, etc.) would be enough to deal with it - you need the chunky large ring type, from Maplins or eBay or similar. I wasn't impressed with this when I got mine, but otherwise it seems to work just fine.

E.

 

[ColeyS1]

Any thing over 6mm and I use the 18 volt. Wonder if some people are working them too hard ? If it struggles to put in a 5 x 80 in hardwood, I give it a 10 out of 10 for effort put it down, then use the bigger impact driver. Im always amazed at the new range of cordless stuff that keeps being brought out- I still regret getting a yankee screwdriver all them years ago cause it never really got used :???: