It’s no secret that there are a lot of tool brands available today that can be a double-edged sword. Sure, there are more options than ever, and that can go a long way toward building a dream collection. At the same time, it can be difficult to decide which is the right choice for you. After all, brands come in different price points, quality levels and, on a much less essential note, color schemes, leaving you with a lot to consider before swiping your card. In some rare cases, the choice is made easier by the surprising lack of overlap between brands.
While most tool companies cover the same ground, offering all kinds of drills, grinders, saws, and other common parts, there are some areas where they can differ. For example, both DeWalt and Makita, two of the biggest names in the tool game, have many of the same tools in their catalogs. You can complete a sizeable collection of standard power tools from any of them without straying from your chosen brand. However, if you go with Makita, you may find that it lacks certain tools. Thus, you will have to look to competitors like DeWalt to fulfill your tool needs.
Within their respective tool lists, DeWalt and Makita overlap considerably. However, just as there are a lot of tools that Makita makes that Milwaukee doesn’t, there are a few that DeWalt makes that Makita doesn’t currently have for sale.
Read more: 13 Milwaukee Niche Tools (And What They’re Used For)
Makita has no crimping tools in the catalog
A stock image of a DeWalt die crimping tool. – DeWalt
While both Makita and DeWalt have suitable tools for a number of different tasks, there are some gaps in the Makita catalog. One area that doesn’t get a lot of coverage under the Makita umbrella is electrical work, especially when it comes to the tools needed to handle cable-intensive jobs. If you need something capable of crimping copper and aluminum cable, for example, Makita is not the brand to go for. Fortunately, if you’re willing to look to DeWalt for answers, the brand offers a handful of crimping tool kits: the 20V Max Compact Crimping Kit, the 20V Max Crimping Kit, and the 20V Max Crimping Kit.
As their name suggests, the core of these kits are their crimping tools – a type of tool that Makita has not added to its offerings until now. These kits are all battery powered and come with DeWalt batteries, although they differ in other areas. The compact crimper is capable of handling 600 MCM Cu and 350 MCM Al for copper and aluminum cable, and the head can rotate 180 degrees. Meanwhile, the other two crimpers both achieve crimping capacities of 750 MCM Cu and 750 Al. As their product names point out, two of the three kits require U dies, and the compact crimper specifically requires DeWalt dies to function. Crimping tools are not essential to everyone’s toolbox, nor are they DeWalt tools that every beginner would find useful. For those who need them, between it and Makita, DeWalt is the only choice. Maybe one day Makita will bring their own to market.
DeWalt has grinders, unlike Makita
A stock image of a standing DeWalt floor sander. – DeWalt
In the major tool brands on the market today, grinders are some of the most common tools. From belt sanders to manual orbital sanders, there are plenty of options. Looking at what DeWalt and Makita have available, you can do most jobs big and small with either brand. However, we wouldn’t be talking about grinders in this context if it weren’t for Makita missing a type that DeWalt has already released. Unlike Makita, DeWalt offered customers not just one, but several different models of floor sanders for their next floor renovation project.
The biggest of the bunch is the DeWalt wood floor drum sander, which has a 1.5 HP dual capacitor motor, a dust bag to shorten cleaning time, and a lever to lower the drum for more or less intensive sanding. Looking for smaller but still capable models, there is the DeWalt Orbital Wood Floor Sander and the DeWalt Rotary Wood Floor Sander. The rotary model has 1.5 hp on its own, while the orbital model works with three 1/3 hp motors. Of course, the orbital is intended more for finer sanding, and the rotary is designed for more aggressive, more intense sanding work. All in all, DeWalt floor sanders don’t rank among the cheapest DeWalt tools for woodworkers and carpenters, though at least the brand has some variety in its offerings. Time will tell if Makita adds standing floor sanders to its lineup.
Makita’s pneumatic offerings are smaller than DeWalt’s
A person using a DeWalt pneumatic reversible drill. – DeWalt
While the standard in various industries is to use corded or battery powered power tools, these are not the only ways to operate tools. There is also the range of pneumatic tools, which use compressed air to do the job. These tools aren’t as readily available as their battery-powered and plug-in counterparts, nor is their selection as varied, but they’re still there. Makita actually has several air tools, although the selection is limited. Its pneumatic selection includes staplers and nails, along with the air compressors needed to power them. Meanwhile, DeWalt has a larger selection for customers to choose from.
Like Makita, DeWalt has its share of pneumatic staplers, nailers, and air compressors, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg for what the company has developed in the field of air tools. For those who need pneumatic tools, DeWalt has air impact wrenches, reversible drills, and air ratchets available. Along with these tools, DeWalt has pneumatic chisel hammers, angle grinders, cutters, and sanders. To keep them running as long and as efficiently as possible, DeWalt also sells its own oil for pneumatic power tools. Makita hasn’t completely ignored air tools; it just focused on providing customers with some of the essentials. However, by comparison, DeWalt’s selection undoubtedly surpasses it, adding more utility to the purchase of an air compressor.
Plumbing tools are lacking under Makita compared to DeWalt
A person using a DeWalt drain snake on a sink. – DeWalt
From small jobs to the most extensive, plumbing is an incredibly tool-heavy discipline. There are various shapes of pipes, adhesives for different applications, sealants and more to keep track of, requiring deep knowledge and the assistance of a group of plumbing-specific tools. While there are Makita tools that can help in these scenarios, comparatively, the DeWalt is the ideal option for building an arsenal of tools with a focus on plumbing. A look at the selection of pipe and tubing related tools makes it clear how committed the company has been to trying to prepare plumbers for success.
The depth of DeWalt’s plumbing offerings shows just how lacking Makita’s catalog is in this area. Covering some of the more prominent items, DeWalt has a deburring tool for smoothing the cut edges of pipes, specific cutters to reduce the size of copper and plastic pipes, and pipe threads to make pipe connections possible. DeWalt even has PEX expansion tools that don’t require much effort to learn to use and drain hoses, too, among a number of accessories and attachments related to its plumbing tools. To rival DeWalt, Makita has some catching up to do in the plumbing tool department.
All of this is not to say that Makita is a brand worth skipping over DeWalt. Neither brand is necessarily better than the other, each with its own strengths and weaknesses. As I’ve pointed out here, there are simply a few tools and types of tools that Makita hasn’t added to its lineup that DeWalt has.
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Read the original article on SlashGear.