Over at Amazon, they have a new blacked-out Metabo HPT (formerly Hitachi) 18V cordless impact driver kit, WH18DBFL2QB.
If you ask me, this might be positioned as a holiday season 2019 “special buy,” maybe even a Black Friday special. But, we’ll see.
The new Metabo HPT cordless impact driver features a new all-black color scheme. In regard to features and specs, it has a brushless motor and is rated at 1522 in-lbs max torque.
- 1/4″ hex drive
- 1522 in-lbs max torque
- 3100 RPM
- 2300 BPM
- LED worklight
- Length: 5-1/32″
- On-tool battery indicator
- Weighs 2.9 lbs with 1.5Ah battery
The kit comes with a 1.5Ah Li-ion battery and charger.
Price: $159
This new Metabo HPT brushless impact driver lacks a lot of the features and premium specs that make the Hitachi/Metabo HPT triple hammer impact driver a personal favorite. See Ben’s review of the triple hammer impact driver here. However this new single-speed model is significantly less expensive.
At $159, this new blacked-out cordless impact driver is still NOT a particularly HOT value. Consider the similar WH18DBFL2S model, which looks to feature the same exact tool but in typical Hitachi and Metabo HPT green and black color scheme.
This impact driver, which looks to have the same exact specs, also comes with a removable belt clip and carrying bag, and is bundled with a higher capacity compact 3.0Ah battery.
Price: $148
Discussion
If you don’t care about blacked-out vs. green and black color schemes, the WH18DBFL2S bundle gives you a higher capacity battery and extra accessories, plus $11 savings in your pocket.
With no carrying bag, belt clip, a 1.5Ah battery, and blacked-out color scheme, plus the October launch, I’d bet that the WH18DBFL2QB kit will almost definitely be a holiday 2019 special buy.
The blacked-out cordless impact driver kit is currently $159. If it is destined for holiday season or Black Friday discounting, what price do you think we’ll see it at? $99 is a magical number for single-battery impact drivers and drills. If we don’t see it priced that low, perhaps $119? $129?
Speaking frankly, $99 would almost be necessary for this model to succeed at holiday sales. There are going to be brushless impact driver kits from Dewalt, Makita, and Milwaukee Tool at this price point. Bosch has a brushed motor impact driver kit at $89 at the time of this posting, and we might see $99 pricing on their Gen 1 or even Gen 2 “FREAK” 2-in-1 impact driver kits.
In my opinion, $159 is too high for what you get with this blacked-out special edition cordless impact driver, at least compared to the “regular” kit.
Let’s for the moment assume that this Metabo HPT kit is destined to be priced at $99 for Black Friday 2019 or the Holiday 2019 shopping season. If you’re in the market for a 1-battery impact driver kit, how likely are you to buy this one?
Speaking personally, I love my Hitachi/Metabo HPT 18V triple hammer impact driver. But, my driver also has the triple hammer engineering and multiple speed and torque options. If I can’t get those features at the $99 “special buy” price point, then the comparative factors come down to max torque, tool size, battery capacity or count, and how appealing I find that brand’s 18V cordless power tool platform.
Metabo HPT tools typically offer solid engineering. I’d find this to be strong competition in the “special buy impact driver” category, but only at $99. If it’s priced any higher, and too many advantages would be awarded to competing brands, objectively speaking.
If this turns out to be a special buy at $99, would you buy it over other brands’ $99 impact driver kits?
If you *must* have a blacked-out impact driver at this price, also consider Makita’s sub-compact model, which is $159 for the one-battery kit.
