Earlier in the holiday shopping season, I caught glimpse of an advance list of Amazon tool deals. This Porter Cable 8-tool 20V Max cordless power tool combo kit, PCCK619L8, looked to have been slated for a Black Friday deal of the day. That didn’t happen, but I kept a close eye on this kit.
Now, the 8-tool combo kit has dropped in price, to $349. Looking at historical pricing, I can see that it typically lives at a price of $400 or more. It was $450 when it first landed on my radar as a prospective deal of the day item.
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Now, it’s back at $349, and it looks like it might stay there for some time, possibly as a mid-to-late-season holiday deal.
I tend to like Porter Cable 20V Max cordless power tools, for the value-priced tools that they are. This kit gives you a good selection and cordless power tools, a 1.5Ah battery pack, and a 4.0Ah battery pack.
Is this something I’d buy for myself, today? No. Is this something I would have loved to have received a few years ago when I could only budget for a cordless drill kit? Absolutely.
For a DIYer or pro on a very strict budget, this kit gives you a lot of functionality for a reasonable price.
Some of the tools are Porter Cable’s less premium offerings, such as the drill and impact driver, but the circular saw is a 6-1/2″ model, rather than their 5-1/2″ saw, and you get 1.5Ah and 4.0Ah battery packs, rather than 1.3Ah batteries.
So, while it’s not a premium Porter Cable cordless combo kit, there are a few upgrades that add to its value.
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Price: $349
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Toolfreak
Pretty good for the money, with the 4.0Ah battery and the two carrying bags.
If you don’t really need such a variety of cordless tools though, definitely consider a higher end set with the tools you know you need for similar money instead.
skfarmer
they are more than likely fully functional but could they be any more ugly? on top of that they look awkward.
Stuart
Yes, they could be way uglier. =)
Toolfreak
I think the “bionic” look works well, though the light gray does set the Porter + Cable stuff apart from the rest, it also makes them look cheaper and less “mean” than if they were, say, all black with just the Porter + Cable logo background being gray.
Not bad for a brand that’s aiming to be just above the Black & Decker stuff and not get too close to their DeWalt line.
Kent
Needs more batteries, this should come with 2×4.0 and a 1.5 at a minimum. I understand that affects the price but with all them tools you gotta be able to properly power them.
Toolfreak
That’s how they plan to make money – sell you all those tools and give you one 4.0Ah battery to show you the difference between it and a 1.5Ah, so you go out and buy a 2-pack of the 4.0Ah so you can grab a tool and use it without having to swap batteries every time.
Tool of the trade
Porter cable aren’t the only ones that are too stupid to only give you 2 batteries for 8 tools. Milwaukee, Dewalt, etc only give you 2 batteries for 9 tools. There should be a 3ah+ battery for every 2 tools if you buy a 8 or 9 tool combo kit. Just goes to show how cheap these bastards are & how they try to get you to buy their overpriced batteries. Dewalt and Milwaukee are even worse. Question is why aren’t the batteries supplied in the $500+ kit to begin with? Technically there’s only one battery with this kit. That small battery won’t work with over half of the tools in the kit. They do such a great job of looking out for their customers, don’t they?
Stuart
If you want more batteries than a kit comes with, you can spend more to buy them separately.
If a kit was bundled with more batteries and was priced higher, you’re stuck spending more for those other batteries you might not want, need, or want to pay for right away.
Toolfreak
That’s how they make money – on the batteries. They do make money on the tools, for sure, but the profit margin on the mass-produced and limited-number-of-charges batteries is a lot higher.
So yeah, it’s intentional that these large tool sets come with only a pair of batteries, on the other hand, you know that going in, so it’s not like they’re advertising each tool as having a battery and then you’re duped when you buy the set and discover there’s only two batteries for the whole kit.
Plus, it lets the customer choose if they want/need a regular or higher capacity battery pack. It’d suck to be stuck buying a tool set that only came with lots of 1.5Ah packs when you’d rather they make the kit cheaper and buy your own higher capacity packs. Same for those who’d rather have the lighter, smaller packs. Not a bad idea to have one of each battery in a kit so the customer can decide which works best for them and base their future battery purchase on that.
James Davis
A company exists to make money, while offering a product or service. It is not a charity, nor should it behave like one. Pick your brand and go to work….. Or play! I agree batteries are the limiting factor, but a company hires exactly enough people to properly function to provide a service or products. It makes profit and the update cycle rolls on. If the product is inferior, people will know who the “bastards” are. I have sixteen M12 tools, and sixteen batteries. I also have ten chargers. I was more than willing to pay for it. Professional power tools are not cheap, and we wouldn’t want cheap tools.
skfarmer
this post really bothers me. i would like to know exactly why one of the batteries (i assume the smaller one) won’t run half of the tools. it may not run them as long as a larger one but if it fits on the tool it will power them.
Adam g
Off topic but right now dewalts hybrid shop vac dcv581h is 79.99 it seems
skfarmer
wow, lots of attitude about batteries here. why doesn’t a socket set with 100’s of pieces come with more than a couple ratchets? why doesn’t a drill come with a full set of drill bits? why doesn’t a grinder come with every possible grinding/ wire wheel? why doesn’t an impact wrench come complete with a full set of sae and metric sockets? why not deep and swivel as well?
because not everyone wants or needs them. unless i want the extra run time, i prefer the smaller battery sizes. i suppose you may get a little extra power with the larger batteries but it has never been a big deal to me.
keep the price down and let me decide what i want for batteries.
i feel that i am intelligent enough to know that if i want or need more batteries i can easily figure that into the total investment cost.
beyond that, i would bet in the majority of cases someone who buys into a very large set like that already has tested the water and has a single tool or smaller combo kit in that platform. meaning? they more than likely have 1- 3 batteries. from experience i have found having more than 4 or 5 batteries is not a big advantage. it is harder to keep track of which ones have a full charge and with so many batteries one tends to leave them in a tool until used up and then you have a pile of batteries with a partial or no charge.
i like the idea from mfgs on a free item with a combo kit. let me decide whether i want an extra tool or battery. it is very handy to have an extra drill or impact driver on a project that can be setup with a different size drill/driver bit and a monster hammer drill may not be the best choice when using an 1/8 or smaller drill bit. jmop
Bolt
I’d prefer the similarly priced ryobi 10 tool combo to this especially for a home owner.
Bolt
Actually now that I think about it the ryobi combo has almost the exact tools that I own, aside from lawn stuff and the new drill and angle grinder I just bought.
Joe
I’d go Ryobi over PC any day. This line of tools is not that good. I gave some PC stuff to friend for a birthday and the tools just feel cheap and underpowered. On the other hand I’ve had a Ryobi blue router for a decade and it’s actually more powerful then the new rigid cordless router,which I have. I’m bought the new Ryobi router to replace the rigid..
You can’t go wrong with Ryobi tools and their line up….PC is just Dewalt leftovers and poorly made…buy a set and tell me how great they are 2yrs from now…
Ken
Ryobi batteries are the worst! They don’t last, I have five batteries that are no good didn’t last a year, my DeWalt tools and batteries outperform by a wide margin!
jsb
Ryobi batteries haven’t given me any trouble once they got out of NiCad. Have had trouble with one “reconditioned” charger though.