irondarren
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Ok on another thread i was bitching about cheap powertools that were not up to the job, i compared a metabo grinder and a dewalt one and mentioned power output. I thought i would give a good seperate explanation of what it really means, as in all honesty it should affect your decission to either buy powertool A or powertool B
As far as I know every manufacture always states input power, the xxx grinder 800watts. Most people would use this to decide if the powertool was powerful enough for there needs, but strickly this is an inaccurate measurement.
What your really need is the power output figure, all well and fine knowing how much power a tool consumes, put how much power are you getting to the job. Anyone thats played with cars and tried to increase there performance might be familiar with the difference in brake horse power at the flywheel and the difference at the wheels. Basically the same applies to powertools, and efficency of the the motor is the main reason for this.
which is more powerful a 800w grinder or a 1000w grinder, well thats obvious isn't it? Not really if the 1000w motor has a power output of 600w then its only 60% effecient but if the 800w motor has a power output of 620w then its 77% effiecent and more powerful than the 1000w motor. So in all honestly the 800w motor grinder would have been a better purchase. Many manufacture don't supply power output figures of there tools (mostly the cheap nasty one), possibly because they are ashamed of them or they just don't come close to the quality powertool manufactures.
In a world where we are being asked to cut our carbon footprint and general power consumption, i guess we should all be more responsible and buy the most power effiecent tools we can.
I'll do a bit of net research later and try and find power output figures on 4.5grinders from various makers and post results for power input and output here so you can see the comparison
As far as I know every manufacture always states input power, the xxx grinder 800watts. Most people would use this to decide if the powertool was powerful enough for there needs, but strickly this is an inaccurate measurement.
What your really need is the power output figure, all well and fine knowing how much power a tool consumes, put how much power are you getting to the job. Anyone thats played with cars and tried to increase there performance might be familiar with the difference in brake horse power at the flywheel and the difference at the wheels. Basically the same applies to powertools, and efficency of the the motor is the main reason for this.
which is more powerful a 800w grinder or a 1000w grinder, well thats obvious isn't it? Not really if the 1000w motor has a power output of 600w then its only 60% effecient but if the 800w motor has a power output of 620w then its 77% effiecent and more powerful than the 1000w motor. So in all honestly the 800w motor grinder would have been a better purchase. Many manufacture don't supply power output figures of there tools (mostly the cheap nasty one), possibly because they are ashamed of them or they just don't come close to the quality powertool manufactures.
In a world where we are being asked to cut our carbon footprint and general power consumption, i guess we should all be more responsible and buy the most power effiecent tools we can.
I'll do a bit of net research later and try and find power output figures on 4.5grinders from various makers and post results for power input and output here so you can see the comparison