Electric - M12 Fuel. 1/2 Hammer Drill-Driver

I love this thing. I know I have a bias for Milwaukee but for a 12V product, this thing can do EVERYTHING. I used it at work for a short while, and there wasn't a task I couldn't do with this thing. Having the 1/2" chuck was the best part of this product. Its a bite sized drill that works like a full sized drill. Because of its size, I can fit it in places that a full sized drill can't. Doesn't get any better especially when most of the projects I do aren't very strenuous. This drill makes those small projects fast and easy. If I do use it for larger projects, it still performs great. The only thing that holds it back would be the size of the battery you put in it, but I do have 6.0 Ah batteries so it can last quite a while.

I bought this for my son that is in aircraft mechanic school. He really likes its size for tight work areas on airplanes. Great drill, great price. I bought aftermarket batteries and this drill works well.

I recently changed brand loyalty from Team Lime-Green to Team Red (yes, I know. Both TTI and Chinese). I currently have some new M12 tools (all FUEL) and plan to expand to M18 as well. I was amazed by the power for the compact size. The only thing I do not like about the Milwaukee brand is the price. I need to drill into masonry and never acquired a hammer drill over the years. I saw the little 3404-20 in a big box hardware store for about $150. I checked Amazon and found this listing from Tartaglia's Tools - less than a hundred bucks! Too good to be true! I bought it six seconds later. As I waited the two days for delivery, I searched Youtube for examples of the drill being put to the test. It was at this point where this story changes. Many of the videos were testing Genuine Milwaukee tools with counterfeits. Milfauxkee, DeFault and Makinda if you will. Many of the copies came from Amazon unfortunately. So, I started to figure that the "too good to be true" was just that. You get what you pay for. So...when it arrived expected a phony TEMU, Ali Express, Wish hunk of trash. The 3404 arrived in a generic brown box with what appeared to be a genuine Milwaukee operator's manual. The drill itself was solid and looked "real" enough to be a REALLY good copy or the genuine article. I compared the overall feel of the tool, directional button shape and size, coloring of the plastic, fasteners used and sticker placement, color and spelling. I looked for all the "tells" that the videos showed as tip-offs for a counterfeit tool. I found none. Now I wanted to test it out! I took a small 2.0 battery from my 2505-22 kit and a crappy masonry drill bit (1/4") that came with a bit kit i got several years ago. I found a paver, a red brick, concrete footing for my deck and a piece of granite. I drilled into the paver and brick as deep I could go with the 4" bit within 10 - 20 seconds using only medium downward pressure. The concrete footing took a little bit more pressure but wasted no time bottoming out. The chunk of granite, however, only got a half inch deep hole drilled into it using heavy pressure - until the bit snapped. Long story short (too late), this little beast is no phony. This is the real thing. Solid tool. It's got some really good torque and a bit of a kick too. All this using the tiny 2.0 battery. I will definitely cough up the cash for the 5.0 high output for this thing.

This is one of the best 12 volt drills I have bought over the last 40 years. I also bought one as a gift for my sister but she couldn't get the battery in and out so she never used it. For me it is a light version of a hammer drill that I bring when I work out of town and might get surprised on a job where maybe I have to drill into block walls. I used it in Alabama on a hotel job where I ended up drilling 400 holes into concrete block walls to mount thermostats and it did the job and didn't wear out (which I expected it to). It also has two speeds fast speed around 1500 RPM and of course is variable speed. It has a clutch so you can use with hex bit to use as a screw driver. It is a solid purchase. Milwaukee has a lot of very overpriced tools but this is a bargain. They have a whole line of 12 volt tools that are light to medium duty. I have good number of 12 volt and 18 volt Milwaukee tools and this ranks near the top for usefulness. I have at least 12 to 18 batteries for the 12 volt Milwaukee tools and most are the worthless small 12 volt batteries - buy the 5 amp hour or larger 12 volt batteries. Also I have tried aftermarket batteries (Waitley) from Amazon for Milwaukee these knock-off batteries don't seem to work well- they lock out and you have to take them out and put back in. Another problem is they tend to come loose and fall out. The opposite is true of the Milwaukee batteries that are hard to remove. I have 2 or 3 18volt Milwaukee hammer drills and they aren't anything special. My top 3 brands of power tools are Milwaukee, DeWalt and Makita and then everything else. Special shout out to Bosch and maybe Hitachi and of course those expensive European brands. What about Hilti? -overpriced but suppose to be very heavy duty I've only used Hilti's that were already worn out. Other notes: Milwaukee drill bits suck and are overpriced. Bosch makes better drill bits and always use oil or WD40 when drilling metal no matter the brand or you will immediately wear out your bits esp. expensive bits. I have some after market batteries for 18 volt Makita and for Paslode that work fine but I haven't tried any for 20 volt DeWalt yet but I've mostly switched over to Milwaukee cordless. When you buy cordless tools don't be like me and have 50 batteries for 6 to 8 brands of tools stick with a good brand with lots of tools (skip those Harbor Freight deals) unless you aren't doing much but light DIY stuff.

This hammer drill is amazingly strong, with a big 1/2” chuck. It’s tempting to say “for a 12 volt tool” but that’s wrong. This guy delivers plenty of power, and the hammer mode is great for long or stubborn screws. Feels comfortable in the hand. Lightweight. Serious tool.

Milwaukee m12 drill is quite powerful for a 12 volt product. It’s got a quality chuck on it and feels good in your hand. These tools have come a long way since the first cordless units years ago. I especially like the hammer function and being so compact it means I don’t have to pull out my big (and really powerful) Milwaukee hammer drill which is heavy and seems like a big production to get it set up to drill a smaller hole through brick of cinder block. Great product and I’d buy it again if I had too.

I'm not really going to review this product, I think everyone already knows the M12 lineup are really great tools and it does the job it's made to do. The question that I think everyone is asking is: How can this be such a good deal? It's half of MSRP. Is it refurbished? Returned? I'm pretty confident that this is just arbitrage, the sellers are just buying combo deals from Home Depot and other authorized retailers then selling the individual tools separately. Right now if I wanted to have spent $220 I could have gotten a really good combo deal at Home Depot with this drill, the impact driver, two batteries, and a bit kit. It's a Labor Day sale, some of the combos at HD are more than 50% below MSRP - for something you can walk into a local store and buy, 100% sure it's legit. I notice the same seller I bought this from also has the driver available, and the drill/driver combo is very common. There's no Milwaukee package, because the combo comes in a single box. There's no bag/case because the combo only comes with one bag for both tools. There's no charger or batteries, because the combo either didn't come with them, or because the seller is selling those individually too. Basically, someone spent the $220 I don't have to get a really good deal on some tools, then they re-sold them for well under MSRP but still for more than they paid for them. The drill I got was just in a box in a plastic bag, with the instructions. Milwaukee includes separate instructions for each tool in a combo, and the plastic bag is the same sort genuine tools come in. I compared the drill to another tool I have, the plastic is identical in color and texture, the rubber grip material feels identical. There's no sign that the item is anything but authentic. It also doesn't appear to be used, it's perfectly clean with no dust, finger prints, etc. There is oil/grease anywhere I expect to find it on a new tool, but no grease marks on the handle that would indicate use. There aren't any witness marks on the battery contacts either, so the sign anyone even powered it on. It looks like someone opened up a combo pack, took out this drill in its plastic bag, stuck it into a carboard box along with the manual, and taped it up. Milwaukee could deny warranty on it, that's true. But since it cost HALF of MSRP, I could just buy another one if it fails and not have spent more than if I bought it from Home Depot. I would need to buy two, and have them both fail in the same way, to be SOL. And I've heard many anecdotes of Milwaukee honoring the warranty anyway. Bottom line: Seems legit, and for the price it's definitely worth it. They do lose a star though, because they could have packaged it better.

Love it’s compact size without trading off for the power of a full size