Customer Reviews

Factory-Reconditioned DEWALT DW257R Heavy-Duty 6.2 Amp Deck/Drywall Screwdriver

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Nicely balanced, plenty of power, and comfortable and a great price. If you are doing strictly drywall you may prefer the DW251R (0-4000 rpms) vrs the DW257R (0-2500 rpms).

I had better luck than the reviewer above. Mine works great, clutch and all. The only reason I gave it 4 stars is that I would have prefered a metal front part of the driver as opposed to plastic. I'm not a contractor, so this probably will not make a difference to me.

I bought the DeWalt to install a metal shingle roof on my house. I already have a cordless drill/driver, but I didn't think it would be up to driving that many screws into 2" car-decking and I think I was right. But the DW257 was up to the task, with no problems. I am glad to have it, and have used it for a few other in the shop screw gun kind of projects since that I would have used the cordless for in the past.

Review update: original review appears below. Updated review, after getting one defective one I got my hands on a second refurb which works fine. I would upgrade to 3 or 4 stars if I could. Disgruntled review of defective drill follows.


I thought reconditioned meant good as new, but not in this case. The drill I got looks like it hasn't really been used, but had enough faint marks on it to make me think it had been handled before, maybe used a bit. Long enough that the previous owner discovered it was defective and returned it. Well, as soon as I turned it on, I found that the clutch does not work properly (always engaged, in rare moments it works right). Then I also found that the mechanism for holding the screw bit in is messed up as well, it's very hard to replace a bit after one is taken out (which requires pliers by the way, at least on this unit). Terrible quality control, I don't believe this was "reconditioned", just put back in a box after a customer return and resold without testing. The problems with this drill are obvious and it should never have been shipped out this way. Also I noticed about this drill is that it consumes a huge amount of power when starting up, way more than the rated 7 amps. I don't have a measurement but from the way the lights on the same circuit dim down, I'm guessing it draws about 20 or more amps for the first 1/2 second or so. Good and strong motor, I guess, goes with that territory. I might give a high rating for the drill if it worked. This gets 1 star as a reconditioned item.

....even if it's reconditioned.

Makes nice clean dimples on sheetrock once you replace the factory bit with a real drywall bit. It has enough torque that it DOESN'T EVEN BURP when you finish driving the screw! Does great with square-head composite deck screws as well.

It has been utterly reliable and adjustable for different jobs. One thing that I do, that is probably not recommended by the manufacturer, is in some circumstances I found it is better to just remove the nose piece rather than messing around and getting it adjusted properly, but for sheetrock it's best to leave it on.