By Mark Clement
Well, they got this one right.
The company that revolutionized the professional jobsite 20 years ago with its 9.6 volt "stick" battery cordless drill-driver has re-vamped its drilling/driving line with an exemplary new drill/hammer drill. The 18-volt Lithium Ion (LI) powered BHP451 is a sweet dovetail of power, feel, and features. And I like the battery platform Makita chose to bring this tool to market.
Power. When the words "drill/hammer drill" are in the title of the tool, a tool needs some "umph" to back it up—and the BHP451 has tons of it. It blasted a 3/4" auger bit through an 8-3/4" sandwich of pressure treated lumber and composite decking material like it was powered by my truck engine and hogged through all the holes I needed with energy to spare.
Drilling in concrete and block was the same story. I punched 1/4-inch holes in a hundred year old basement slab for fastening sleeper joists with concrete anchors and plunged pilot holes through concrete block with a 3/8 inch bit to mark the corners of a masonry cut-out. The tool operated with surprisingly little noise and vibration which makes it a great go-to for small holes in concrete and masonry--no fuss, no muss.
Feel. When I’m driving a zillion screws in a row for decking, subfloor, or drywall, how the tool feels in my hand—at the first screw and the last—matters. Makita’s new industrial design combines a nice tapered handle with excellent balance. The tapered handle (smaller at the bottom, flared near the trigger) makes hanging on to the tool in every position I came across comfortable. The trigger is perfectly positioned and easy to pull, and the overmold rubber on the handle provides the perfect gripping surface.
Battery exchange is important to me, and Makita’s is about the slickest I’ve seen. I love the wide—single—battery release tab. No more do I have to reach both sides of the tool at once to engage the battery tabs. And the slide-on battery moves into position almost effortlessly. A cool detail Makita added is that the battery locks onto the charger, too. That means you get a positive connection with the charger at re-charge time, but I also like it as a double check for the laborer who picks up the charger (battery and all) at the end of the day only to lose or damage a battery on his way to the truck. That’s not a problem with this system.
The switches are also nice. Moving the large tab on top of the tool between settings (hammer, rotation only, or rotation with clutch) is easy and there are three speed settings on the tool—high torque, high speed, and a middle setting good for driving mid-sized screws that require a combination of power and speed. The forward/reverse switch is a cinch to operate.
Features. The BHP451 has two bright white work lights positioned right above the trigger that illuminate when you engage it. My first thought was that this was a bit gimicky and that I’d only like it in oddball circumstances like when I was stuffed in a cabinet or hanging a closet pole at dusk, but I soon realized I liked the light when I burned the midnight oil and/or the jobsite was poorly lit. Long story short, I could find screw heads without squinting in all kinds of light conditions, and I liked it.
The unit’s body is surrounded by rubber overmold in 99% of the places it matters, so when you put the tool down on an expensive countertop or porcelain sink surround, rubber rather than steel is making contact. 1% of the tool body that can contact the work is metallic (right near the clutch dial) but I feel it poses little threat to finished work because the contact area is both smooth and miniscule.
Belt hooks have been a hit or miss feature in the drill/driver category, but this one hits. It’s positioned right above the battery so when the tool hangs it’s in an easy-to-grab position. The hook itself slides over a thick belt, into a pants pocket or over the lip of your nail bags. I wish, however that the exterior surface of the hook had protective overmold like the tool body. Its bare steel surface would make me want to wrap the exterior of the hook in a layer of duct tape. The good news is that if tape isn’t good enough for you, you can detach the hook easily.
The bit holder is positioned on the opposite side of the tool from the hook. It holds two bits, which is handy. It’s soft-ish plastic so I don’t worry too much about delicate work, even though you can take this off if you want too.
The steel, 3-jawed Jacobs chuck centers bits nicely when inserting them and holds them tight (particularly nice when drilling in concrete or masonry.) I do wish it had a bearing collar, but I’m not loosing any sleep because it doesn’t.
Battery Chemistry. The BHP451 is part of Makita’s LXT lithium Ion series of tools, and the battery lives up to the promise of the chemistry—which is more power in a smaller package. In addition to a new power platform, the Lithium Ion chemistry has enabled manufacturers to dial in how they bring their tools to market. In other words, for NiCad and NiMH powered tools, everybody was working on basically the same voltage platforms: 12, 14.4, 18. With LI, tools can be packed in equivalents. For example, Makita’s tools are about the size of 12 volt NiCads but perform like an 18 volt NiCad—more power, smaller package. I like this platform. It enables Makita to build a small but powerful tool that performs well in all kinds of jobsite conditions.
I also enjoyed the constant power flow LI provides. There’s no slow tailing off of power like NiCad batteries. When an LI battery is out of juice (and it takes much longer than a NiCad battery for it to get there—much longer), it’s out of juice. So, you just go drop it in the charger, get a new one, and get back to doing just about any drilling or driving task on site. Cords need not apply.
The BHP451 is available separately or bundled in a kit with other Makita LXT tools. It is in wider distribution in kit form. If you purchase the tool alone, the model # is BHP451Z.
BHP451, $329.
www.Makita.com, BHP451, $329.
Mark Clement is a remodeler and author of The Carpenter’s Notebook and The Kid’s Carpenter’s Workbook, Fun Family Projects! Learn more at TheCarpentersNotebook.com.
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