Hilti and Home Depot

[J.Foxtrot]

Long time lurker, first time poster here. I'm in the market to purchase a rotary / combo hammer drill. My old Makita chipping hammer from year one has given up life and my milwaukee hammer drill still works well, but was never great at drilling the bigger holes.

I was in the big orange box yesterday checking out the Hilti's... back in the day when I last worked on a commercial site I did not see a plumber or electrician that did not use Hilti, hence my intrest in purchasing one. Now for my question... is the Hilti sold in HD the same as the old Hilti I used to see ??? I'm always skeptical of the products sold at HD that have a name brand but are different (Rigid, Square D Home Line, etc.)

I also thought about a Bosch, I was on the CPO website and looked at a few that would fit my intentions perfectly, I have been very happy with the previous stuff I purchased from CPO Bosch.

I'm curious if anyone has info on Hilti at HD ... is it the same old Hilti company, or is it a line specifically sold to HD, etc.

Any info would be appreciated.

[Jeremy]

Re: Hilti and Home Depot

Welcome J.

I noticed Hilti at HD a few months back and wondered the same thing. From all external apperances the DX460 they have on display is the exact same as the one I have direct from Hilti. They had the collated magazine, but no collated fasteners. That's real convienent. My guess it that they are the same as you'd get from a distributor, which confuses me.

Hitli has always seemed, at least in my area, to be kind of selective about who they sell to. It can be tough to get supplies unless you have the reps phone number. Why is HD carrying such an exclusive line of tools, but also moving away from the big brands of tools in favor of Rigid and Ryobi?

I don't see this lasting. DIY'ers are going to see the $95 Ryobi hammerdrill and then the $200 Hilti hammerdrill. Wonder which one they are gonna choose?

[J.Foxtrot]

Re: Hilti and Home Depot

Thanks for the reply Jeremy... you bring up many points that I have noticed with HD over the past few years. They seem to be going in the direction of Sears with their own line of tools (Rigid vs Craftsman), that is why I thought it was really odd to see Hilti. In the HD's by me Hilti seems to have it's own little store within the store, with it's own Hilti salesman. A friend told me that he thinks it's a concession, just like Nathan's had, Hilti pays a fee to operate within HD and HD also gets a % of each sale. That sorta made sense...

I looked at Hilti's website and the part numbers all matched what I saw at HD, no additional characters. You hit the nail on the head with the type of product Hilti is, HD tends to cater to the more thrifty spender, I associate Hilti as a high end industrial tool, not something a DIY would bother to invest in (nor should they).

I used to work with a guy who's brother is a HD manager... I dropped him an mail to try and find out more.

I know I must seem like I am over thinking this but I feel if I'm investing $500 in a tool I want to know I am getting my money's worth.

[dave_k]

Re: Hilti and Home Depot

I know I must seem like I am over thinking this but I feel if I'm investing $500 in a tool I want to know I am getting my money's worth.

I've used a lot of Hilti tools over the years and I have a couple of their SDS drills. The upside is that they are excellent tools well designed and durable. The downside is that they can't be repaired just anywhere and they are expensive to repair. I also own Bosch rotary hammers and SDS drills that are every bit as durable and can be repaired almost anywhere for a reasonable cost. I think the Bosch drilling and chipping tools are the better value but the drill that I keep for my own use is a Hilti.

dave

[dgbldr]

Re: Hilti and Home Depot

What size rotary hammer are you looking for? For a smaller size (1"), the Metabo KHE-D28 is better than the comparable Hilti and quite a bit less money. About $250.

Also better than the comparable Bosch and only about $20-30 more.

[Jon Blakemore]

Re: Hilti and Home Depot

Hitli has always seemed, at least in my area, to be kind of selective about who they sell to. It can be tough to get supplies unless you have the reps phone number. Why is HD carrying such an exclusive line of tools, but also moving away from the big brands of tools in favor of Rigid and Ryobi?

Our HD has a Hilti section with a full time rep. I think Hilti is just leveraging HD's distribution network and availability, while still retaining their upper echelon status and sales support. I don't think the Hilti guy is paid by HD, but I could be wrong about that.

[N.E.Builder]

Re: Hilti and Home Depot

DO NOT BUY HILTI FROM HD!!!!

Hilti from HD is made in mexico!!!! GARBAGE
If you want to buy hilti go to a Hilti dealer, I do a lot of commercial work and use a ton of hilti tools and they all have worked flawless.

You can start here
http://www.us.hilti.com/holus/module...selection=type

[J.Foxtrot]

Re: Hilti and Home Depot

DO NOT BUY HILTI FROM HD!!!!

Hilti from HD is made in mexico!!!! GARBAGE
If you want to buy hilti go to a Hilti dealer, I do a lot of commercial work and use a ton of hilti tools and they all have worked flawless.

You can start here
http://www.us.hilti.com/holus/module...selection=type

AHHHH HA !!! Thank you N.E. Builder... I knew there had to be a catch with the orange box, there almost always is.

I'm not looking to by Hilti specifically, I spent all yesterday cleaning up my home office and shop. Between finding stray gift cards and returning anything with a bar code I have about $400 in HD credit to burn. Since I am in the market for a rotary hammer I figured I would check em' out... that is when I took note of Hilti.

dave_k & dgbldr ... Thanks for the info. I am in the market for a smaller size (1"), lately I have picked up jobs where I had to deal with lots of brick and concrete, even a $500 investment will pay for itself in a month or so.

I'm gonna check out the metabo next, I appreciate the heads up.

Thanks everyone for your help.

[Jeremy]

Re: Hilti and Home Depot

N.E.B.

Where do you get your info? From what I have seen of the Hilti's at HD they come from the same factory that the ones we get from a distributor come from. I find it difficult that Hilti would make crap to sell at HD, but still sell their "good line" through reps. Seems like that would catch up to them in a short time.

The times I have been at HD there has been no Hilti rep in sight. The Hilti's are just in their own little endcap off to the side. I'm sure HD gets a cut of the sales.

OK. Now I'm gonna have to check for myself. I checked the model # on my DX460. It's 367134. HD's is 370448. Mine says "Made in Austria". I'm going to check what the Hilti's at HD say.

[VTNorm]

Re: Hilti and Home Depot

I was doing some work for my folks in MA and the HD I stopped at (Leominster, MA) had a huge Hilti section with a Hilti rep. Said he's paid by Hilti to be there 5 days a week.

This store had a big, big tool section and the Hilti guy was engaged with customers for almost 45 minutes before I got a chance to chat with him. He said his biggest problem is guys that buy what they think is Hilti off of ebay and then can't get it repaired because it'as actually an off-shore knock-off, they come in and give him tons of grief.

Check the part numbers carefully. If the HD versions have any different numbers/letters in their model number from other soruces then Hilti is possibly doing an 'HD only' version. That 'might' mean different quality levels, although I don't for sure.

-Norm

[Jeremy]

Re: Hilti and Home Depot

OK. I just called HD. That poor customer service guy. I made him run across the store.

I had him check where those Hilti's were made. All of the units he checked were made in Austria. My model # is probably different because mine is a few years old. The guy I spoke to said Hilti wants to be more accessable to contractors. The endcap at this HD is right beside, and kind of behind, the contractor sales counter. From what I saw, and I was skeptical too, it is the real deal. The prices seem to say that also. They want $669 for the same gun I have, and I know that is what mine is going for from a rep now anyway.

[Tim Uhler]

Re: Hilti and Home Depot

We have an account with Hilti that we set up through the local Hilti guy. He told us that you will get better pricing ordering off their site and you get free next day shipping. Just select the free shipping, but put the next day or the day after as the day you want what you ordered.

We have bought some Hilti tools from HD, but don't anymore since he told us that. We did buy the DX460 and love it, but we oftentimes run out of the Hilti brand nails and charges and just use Remington and Simpson since the lumberyard is 1 mile away :-)

We did start to lease thier big Rotohammer. The TE7 or something. I think it's this one http://us.hilti.com/holus/modules/pr...jsp?OID=-18536 I think we pay $40/month or something like that. It is a lifesaver, it eats concrete like you wouldn't belive. It has made installing holddowns much much quicker. We bought this bit http://us.hilti.com/holus/modules/pr...jsp?OID=-12097 and it just powered through concrete.

Also, repairing Hilti tools is easy, you request a shipping label and then send in the tool. You do not pay shipping, or at least we haven't had to. We are getting the recip saw repaired for the second time. We use Makita now.

We use the epoxy quite often and so we just order that and hardware from Hilti. It is quite easy.

I don't go into Home Depot and order most of our tools online, so for me its more convienent.

[J.Foxtrot]

Re: Hilti and Home Depot

WOW ... this has gotten interesting. Someday this week I have to get to the HD (for x-mas lights) and will investigate the Hilti situation in detail. I plan on checking out where they are made and I'll get model numbers to compare to the Hilti website and make a decision from there.

I'm always skeptical when it comes to HD. Too many of their items with name brands seem to be lower cost models.

I am very appreciative of all the people that jumped in here...

I will post an update once I do my investigation... LOL.

[Greg Di]

Re: Hilti and Home Depot

I just bought a PD30 Laser Range finder from the Hilti rep at HD. This guy was knowledgable to a fault and a real professional. Although I was in the Big Orange Box, once you step into the Hilti area, it's a truly different world.

This guy was also allowed to make deals and throw things in, which was nice. He gave me his biz card and wrote his cell # on it in case I had any problems.

I'm actually glad that Hilti is in HD because it is convenient. I find their anchors and fasteners to be a lot better and much more consistent than any other brands. I would not bother going the extra 5 miles through traffic to the actual Hilti store, but since I'm at HD often, I buy the Hilti supplies.

I can't believe I just wrote something good about HD. Make a note of this.

[m beezo]

Re: Hilti and Home Depot

Greg.
first time for everything.