Cordless Hammer Drill
A hammer drill, also known as a rotary hammer, is a rotary drill with a hammering action, used mainly for drilling holes in masonry. A hammer drill can drill through brick or concrete much faster than a regular drill. Most hammer drills can also be used as a conventional drill for woodwork or metal. Cordless hammer drills operate in exactly the same way as mains hammer drills but using rechargeable batteries.
The hammering action provided by hammer drills helps to break up masonry so that it can be removed by the drill bit’s flutes. A hammer drill has a specially designed clutch that enables the drill bit to spin at the same time as driving it in and out of the masonry. This hammering action is very fast but the actual distance the drill bit goes in and out is small and each blow is of relatively low force. It creates thousands of impacts per minute, which are enough to break up concrete and brick for the spiral flutes to remove.
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Most modern cordless hammer drills enable the hammer and rotation functions to be used simultaneously or separately. The drill can be used without the hammer action for normal drilling and the hammer can be used without the rotation for chiselling. Together they would be used for drilling masonry and while cordless hammer drills are used for this purpose, the large diameter holes often required in masonry drilling can drain cordless drills quickly.
For uninterrupted use a professional worker would normally have one or more spare battery packs on charge while drilling so that he could use one after another without having to wait hours for one to recharge when it was drained.
The early cordless hammer drills used interchangeable 7.2v battery packs but over time increased battery voltages became available, with 18v becoming the most common. The higher voltages enabled a cordless hammer drill to produce as much torque as some mains powered drills, but they are generally large and heavy.
Apart from their weight the other downside of most of cordless hammer drills historically was the self-discharging and limited life of the battery, due to the use of Ni-Cad batteries. Fortunately the development of Lithium-ion batteries means that these issues will soon be in the past. Some of the large tool manufacturers, such as Makita and Bosch, are now using Lithium-ion batteries in their 18v cordless hammer drills.
The main advantages that Lithium-ion batteries offer are a very short charging time, longer battery life and more lightweight battery packs, even the 18v batteries. Lithium-ion batteries also have a constant power output rate and they hold their charge for much longer periods of time when not in use.
Their power to weight ratio also makes them more comfortable to use for longer periods of time and encourages productivity, as less downtime is required.
