Customer Reviews

Milwaukee 2410-22 M12 12-Volt 3/8-Inch Drill/Driver

5 star:		(61)
4 star:		(17)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

As a long time Milwaukee fan, it was worrying a few years ago when ownership of Milwaukee changed. With that change, there was a concern that the longstanding quality of their tools would diminish. With this 2410-20 drill, there seems to be little to worry about!

The straight and true: the tool is SOLID, fit/finish is excellent, there is no flex in the handle (other than the comfortable, soft coating). The battery has zero slop in the handle, works for longer than expected and charges quickly. Given the compact size, torque is also better than I hoped for with high speed being a great choice for driving screws (took the tool to work for moving audio equipment in a bunch of sound racks).

The wobble: there is only one part that I've found to deserve criticism - the chuck. It seems great and very similar to the excellent chucks on the V18 drills (minus the carbide grip inserts). While there is very little run-out in mine, the chuck auto-loosens. Driving screws in results in the momentum (on high speed) loosening the grip a little bit each time a screw hits bottom (or the brake of the drill is used when letting go of the trigger). Really cranking the chuck tight helps in delaying the loosening but does not seem to eliminate the problem with the screwdriver bit dropping out after 15 to 20 screws. Although this is a huge problem, the tool is good enough otherwise that it is still a keeper.

After experiencing the positive qualities of this Milwaukee tool, I'm very curious to try out more of the M12 line (especially the impact driver for use with screws). Luckily, the new Milwaukee seems to have done a lot to increase the engineering and design speed of tools and seems to have not lost the high quality that makes older Milwaukee tools legendary.

Edited 9-6-2009 to add: Turns out mine is not the only sample that self-loosens the chuck. This is something to be very aware/wary of and it probably would help if each of us with faulty chuck operation went to [...] and communicated to them through their system. It does not take much imagination to see a decent size, sharp spade bit drop from the chuck and poke a hole in a leg of someone working while wearing shorts.

Edited 7-26-2010 to add: Between my experience with 3 of these drills and reading the comments to this review, it seems clear that Milwaukee has a product where they have failed in both design and testing. Given the time they have had to fix the problem but have not, I suggest passing over the M12 tools until Milwaukee demonstrates production of tools that work 100% properly.

New Rating - One Star - what good is a drill that can't hold a bit??

just purchased the 2410 Milwaukee drill as a kit with two batteries 2 months or so ago from Amazon . first impression good . recent experience quite disappointing.
i have used the drill moderately but often during this time. the major problem it he batteries. first charge good. followup battery performance renders the drill only good for small short duration jobs. charges quickly,so far, but no staying power. now i learn that to overcome this problem Milwaukee has brought out a "heavy duty" battery to be bought separately.
i noticed the problem a few days after the amazon full replacement policy.
i had read several reviews before purchasing- most were good. after my problem i read reviews just on the battery and discovered that many people have had the same experience.

Be careful with this one. It is not an inexpensive mistake.

And I thought my chuck problems were isolated! Reading other reviews here shows me it's common!

I've been using cordless Milwaukee 18 volt tools for about 8 years on a daily basis, and am lucky enough to have a service center fairly close by - I've burnt out the switch on a 18v sawzall, brushes in the 1/2" 18v drillmotor ( and yesterday the swtich!) and the parts are readly available - they've given REALLY good service (though the sawzall is probably on it's last legs - it makes a LOT more noise than it used too!).

But I'm re-thinking - it's about time to replace these guys, and my experience with this little drill motor makes me wary about buying all Milwaukee. How hard is it to spec a chuck that holds it's grip? Who the hell wants to climb off a ladder to fetch the bit that you thought was secure in the chuck, only for it to dropout after one use????????? Not only do I not have time for that, I'm getting creaky and it really ticks me off to get up & down for something so stupid - I've NEVER had a chuck with this poor performance in all my 58 years!

And I won't start on the styling business - it does look cool but the little non-functional rubber piping on the side became halfway detached by day 2 and now just flaps around - I should cut it off!

Hope folks from Milwaukee read this & actually pay attention to business - how many customers can you afford to have defect to another brand?

I purchased the 1/4" hex chuck driver a while back and can't say enough good things about it. When I saw this slightly beefier cordless drill from Milwaukee in the same product family I couldn't wait to get it. It's a great size for light duty work. I like the 3/8" chuck because finding a drill bit with a 1/4" hex shank for the other non spade bit drivers that produces a hole larger than 1/4" is not as easy. Having a higher speed range for drilling and having the clutch are also pluses above the basic driver. I have a Bosch 1/2" 18v hammer drill for heavy duty jobs but it's WAY too much drill for light jobs around the house. This Milwaukee drill/driver is a great intermediary range tool. The trigger pull is smooth and consistent and makes controlling the speed of the drill easy, the clutch has enough range to handle plenty of diverse needs and the size is very convenient to have in a holster if you're working on a ladder or wearing it on a tool belt all day. The life of the lithium ion batteries is great and the recharge is pretty quick at 30 or so minutes. The battery technology has clearly come a ways from my old DeWalt 18v NiCd setup. (which was stolen and is the reason I branched out to different systems such as the Bosch and the Milwaukee) The only down side I can find on this drill (and the 1/4" hex driver as well) is that when I'm using the drill in reverse, my index finger on my right hand tends to hit the "forward" button. It's not a large problem, just something I have to consciously think about when using it in reverse. That's a large hands issue though, not really a fault of the drill.

Most the other reviews are covering the extensive pro's on this tool, so I will skip the gushing (mostly). I love this tool. It won't replace your 18v for everything, but for 90% of jobs it'll cover. I've driven a 4" torx screw through a 2x4 into a joist, and then into another 2x4. I've drilled holes in metal. Pushed 1-1/4" spade bits. Everything I expected of this drill and more. I picked this drill up for finish work, but have ended up using it on plenty of rough construction. My only complaints are minor. First, I wish it came with at least one of the extended batteries. Second, can I get a bit holder please?

As far as the chuck that many seem to be complaining about; I've had basically no problems with mine. My guess, is that not everyone is tightening them correctly. On this drill, you are supposed to finish tightening the chuck by hand with the drill off. (Yes I read the directions, its in there) It takes two seconds, and honestly seems more secure and sturdy than my old Makita, or my current Dewalt 18v. When the drill is off, the chuck actually locks in place so when you tighten it you generate more pressure. Not sure why they designed it this way, probably to save wear and tear on the motor. Regardless, I find it easy, quick and secure.

*** Update: After using my Milwaukee, my father purchased one as well. He is a master carpenter and cabinet maker. An authority on woodworking and tools. He has two of the top of the line Dewalt Li-ion drills (DeWalt DCD960Kl 1/2-Inch 18-Volt Cordless XRP Lithium-Ion Drill/Driver Kit) and said he reaches for this more often. When I asked him about his chuck, he said he hasn't had any issues either. He tightens it the way I do, which is how the instructions suggest...

I'm a telecom installer and bought this because my 18 volt DeWalt was too big. I often have to reach deep behind racks or into closets and a full sized drill/driver is just too big. This is small enough to fit in my tool bag, into all the nooks and crannies I have to work in and has enough power to sink a screw fast. The light is a bonus, especially when working in the back of a closet. I usually charge both batteries every weekend just in case, but I've never had one run out in a weeks worth of work. The charge indicator on the side of the unit is a good feature, if I ever did get a battery used up, I could tell before I went into a new site and had to make a trip out to the truck for the spare battery.
For racking and stacking gear this driver will run rack screws down in a heartbeat. I usually set the clutch to 1 or 2 to prevent stripping them when starting, and use second (high) gear to run them in fast. For rack mount ears I use low gear, the screws are so short it doesn't have time to spool up in high gear. When mounting gear on backer boards (3/4 plywood usually) I use low gear and set the clutch to 5, and it will sink a 1 inch screw in just a few seconds. I mention the low setting I use on the clutch because that is a a bit of a draw back. If you use a high clutch setting it has enough torque to strip screws or twist off smaller screws. I'm sure that an engineer could measure the difference between 10 and 20, but I couldn't. I kept setting it lower and lower, thinking that it would not be able to drive a screw in to wood at some setting, but on 1 it will still drive a 2 inch screw into a 4x4. It will eventually slip but I thought 1 would be pretty weak and it isn't.

Over all this tool feels well made and solid. Quality and power are excellent, I would recommend it very highly to any one who needs a small light driver that has power to do pretty big jobs.

I really LOVE this drill! I had a bunch of various household jobs I needed to take care of today and many of them included the need for a cordless drill and a powered screw driver. This tool handled every job I threw at it brilliantly. The fact that the battery was nearly fully charged out of the box was a nice surprise and allowed me to get right to work with my new drill!

The 2410-22 M12 replaces what was then a top of the line Makita cordless drill/driver circa 1992. The original Makita has been my only previous experience with cordless drill/driver tools, but considering that at the time, the Makita was "IT" if you wanted a professional caliber cordless drill, this Milwaukee was worth retiring the Makita for. This unit is much lighter and better balanced than the Makita and appears to have at least the same amount of power/torque which is saying something. It definitely was more precise when it came to driving wood screws. The variable speed motor performed nice and smooth and made driving screws a pleasure! Using it for a drill was also painless. I also like the little LED head lamp the drill has to light up your work! Nice touch to an already impressive package! The other thing I like is the fact that this package comes with TWO LIthium-Ion battery packs instead of just one like all the competing products I looked at before making this purchase.

I haven't seen any of the "chuck" issues that I read about in some of the unfavorable reviews here, so not really sure what that is all about. For me, everything about this package screams value and quality! I love the look of the tool, and the carry case it came with that has a space in it to hold one of the Milwaukee drill bit sets I bought along with the drill. The battery charger also fits nicely in this smart looking carry case as well as the second battery it came with. It is hard to get excited about a drill, but in this case, you can't help but feel good about the purchase when a product does everything so well.

For the price I paid, I am 100% satisfied, and since I had the opportunity to perform pretty much every type of job one would use this tool for today, I felt comfortable writing this review and giving the product the highest score possible. I don't think you could find a better package than this one, and from a brand that has always stood for quality.

I researched this purchase for a month or two, so I knew what I was getting. I'm a homeowner, so my use is mostly a project or two a month, not everyday.

I really liked the Ridgid R92008 12-Volt Lithium-Ion Fuego Drill-Driver and LED Light Combo until i started reading about potential battery problems. Even with free replacement batteries for life, it seemed like more than I wanted to deal with. I steered away from the DEWALT DCD710S2 12-Volt Max 3/8-Inch Drill Driver Kit, because of price and the square bottom battery pack; I thought it would be difficult to maneuver in some tight spots. The Dewalt was comfortable to hold and well balanced though.

For me, the main competition to the Milwaukee 2410-22 was the Bosch PS31-2A 12-Volt Max 3/8-Inch Drill/Driver. I held and played with both in stores and read lots of reviews. Both fit in my hand well, and they had similar performance on paper. I finally decided based on two things: The Bosch apparently has a plastic chuck compared to the Milwaukee's metal chuck and the Milwaukee came with a nice hard plastic case vs. Bosch's padded nylon tote/case.

So I have spent some time with the Milwaukee and I am impressed with it's power, performance and features. I'm mostly comparing to my 5ish-year-old 14.4V Craftsman NiCd drill. The battery life is very good and having a battery monitor is great. When the batteries need charge, it doesn't take long (30 minutes?) and the included charger has a monitor with 4 states based on led status. The worklight LED on the drill is helpful to see what you're doing. The drill never cringed while I was drilling multiple 3-1/2" drywall screws through 2x4s and plywood into big fence posts in a recent project.

Here are my con's: My hand sometimes gets pinched by the led worklight when adjusting the drill torque, because the light overlaps the torque ring. I read one other review that pointed this out and blew it off, but it does suck when it happens. My other con is that the outer chuck (plastic sleeve you hold to tighten the metal jaw) seems to wobble on mine. The metal jaw of the chuck does not wobble and this does not seem to affect performance or cause any problems, but it's a little disconcerting.

If I had to do it again, I'd probably choose the Milwaukee again even though the the Bosch holds a $20 price advantage at this time. I think it might be worth it, just based on having a nicer storage case, as petty as it sounds.

Please review IMPORTANT UPDATE at the bottom of this original review.

This Milwaukee 2410-22 drill/driver in kit is a very nice tool. It comes with the drill/driver, quick charger, 2 RedLithium batteries and a real neat hinged case. (It is important to note that although the kit description says lithium ion batteries, the recent set I purchased contained the RedLithium batteries which are a better product because they have more reserve capacity and are warrantied for a longer period of time.)

I really like this tool. It is very light and powerful. The batteries are extremely light, almost unbelievably so considering the good length of service use they yield. The switch on top that changes the drill from the low speed range to the high, and back, is very easy to move in either forward or aft positions. The trigger is not heavy and is curved so your finger won't slip off; but a little too curved for my taste.

The forward, lock, and reverse switch located above and aft of the trigger is easy to use. The drill comes with a light that comes on with a slight touch of the trigger and before the drill chuck turns. This neat feature allows you to illuminate the work surface before actually drilling. There is a battery level, four position light that gives you power remaining feedback. It illuminates when the trigger is depressed and is located on the left side of the drill near the aft end.

The low speed range gives a decent amount of torque especially considering the size of the drill. The high speed range moves at a surprisingly fast rate again considering the drill size. When you release the trigger, the drill brakes immediately and locks in place. As with most rechargeable drills in this power range, the motor noise is pleasantly quiet.

Now the bad news. With the drill I received, the loosening chuck problem others mention is present. I vigorously tightened the chuck by hand while the drill was stopped and locked just as described in the manual, but driving screws was very frustrating. I had a hex shank hex bit holder with a drive bit in it. While driving screws, the bit holder would fall out every minute or so no matter how tight I made the chuck. I would believe that this design fault would preclude any serious user from purchasing the drill but, as a do it yourself-er, it is just frustrating to me at worst. I had the opportunity to remove about 50 screws in reverse and this problem was not present making me believe that it is only a factor when you drill or drive. When using a round shank drill bit, I can only imagine how bad this problem must be; but not speaking from experience here.

I have several comments on the adjustable torque setting ring located aft of the chuck. First, it is very easy to rotate in either direction and is numbered with easy to see even white numbers inlayed into a black background. The odd settings are marked by depressed lines that are part of the casting. The even numbers are displayed up to 20, odd are counted from 1 to 21. The 22nd black background is the locked position which, when driving, does not allow slippage on a preset torque like all the other settings.

A small bit of not-so-good news is that the first setting on the torque adjustment dial starts too heavy for light duty projects. I find that instead of ratcheting, it drives the screw head into the wood. With 21 torque settings to choose from, I cannot in my wildest imagination understand why the Milwaukee engineers designed the torque range to start so heavy at torque setting 1.

As a do-it-yourself-er, I would have given this drill/driver a 5 star rating if it were not for the chuck problem and what I consider a torque adjuster design flaw. With this said, I really like the tool for its size, lightness, and its power/speed capability with respect to its size and lightness.

IMPORTANT UPDATE: April 23, 2012.

About 10 days ago I contacted Milwaukee (1-800-SAWDUST) about the loosening chuck problem. The representative said that customer service was unaware of this issue so she checked Amazon reviews while I was on the phone with her. After looking at the reviews, she immediately said she would send me another chuck and told me it could be replaced by removing a left threaded screw at the bottom of the inside of the chuck. (When I was speaking with her, I also indicated my displeasure with the heavy torque settings outlined above.) I received the new chuck very quickly: within several business days of calling her.

When I attempted to remove the chuck, several problems occurred. First, the left threaded screw did not come out and started stripping with a Phillips head driver even though the screw is a combination Phillips/slotted head. So I reverted to a slotted head driver, one with a hefty thickness that just fit into the screw head. Turning the left screw CLOCKWISE with this slotted bit did the trick and removed the screw.

Then the next problem arose. I could not remove the chuck no matter how hard I pulled and no matter which direction I turned it. So on the phone again and asked for a technical assistance rep. This man was very informative explaining they have had this problem in some chucks. According to him, this loosening issue is not a design problem, but instead, a manufacturing problem. He said the new chuck they sent me should solve the problem. He also said that the drill should have been sent back to Milwaukee to replace the chuck. I said that was not necessary as long I was instructed how to remove it. See the steps he outlined on how to successfully remove the chuck below.

1- Remove the left threaded screw by turning it CLOCKWISE (As you face the chuck).
2- Tighten the chuck onto the short end of a good sized Allen wrench.
3- Holding the drill, turn the Allen wrench COUNTER-CLOCKWISE (As you face the chuck). If this turning action doesn't loosen the chuck, wrap on the Allen wrench with a mallet or hammer. (I used a small pipe on the end of the Allen wrench to give more leverage in lieu of a hammer.)
4- Upon doing this, the chuck screwed off counter-clockwise.
5- Put the new chuck on doing this procedure in reverse.

Do not spend money buying a chuck from another manufacturer as others have. Instead, call Milwaukee as they will stand behind this product and will send you a chuck for FREE.

At this time, I haven't tested the new chuck. I will take Milwaukee at their word that this will do the trick. If I find out differently, I will update this review at that time. Otherwise, assume that this did the job!

I wanted a light weight driver/drill and after handling the other available units, Milwaukee was my choice. I work with several hand drills when creating wood projects, e.g., one drill for counter-sinking, another for pilot holes--when needed--and a third for driving the screws. I also use the big brother of this driver, the 2601-20, which uses a bigger battery and weighs almost a pound more. To my surprise, this light-weight driver powered 2-1/2 inch deck screws as easily as the big boy. On the side, LEDs light up to indicate the remaining charge, and with two batteries and included 30-minute charger, it was always ready to drive! Torque setting is a snap, and the keyless chuck held tight. Like it's big brother, a LED light illuminates the target when you press the trigger part way.