Drill Doctor DD750X Electric Drill Bit Sharpener, 3/32-3/4" High-Speed, Portable - Steel, Masonry, Carbide, Cobalt, Tin-Coated Bits, Adjustable Angles

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ---- Note: Please see the end, because there IS an update to this story ---- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -(unedited original)Wrecked a considerable pile of drill bits with this one. Mine went "ziiiiing-tick" instead of the "ziiiiiing" the video tells you it should sound like. Just a tiny tick, but since I've never even seen a drill doctor before, and not knowing the "tick" was evil, I continued on. First bits were OK, but got worse very quickly. The angle was getting worse and worse on every bit I sharpened. Which led me to believe I was doing it wrong... so I kept practicing and watching the video, and practicing for hours until most of my drill bits were short and wrecked. By that time, the "ziiiiing tick" was a "ziiing-TWACK", by the way.Being the curious guy I am, I removed the guard and side plug and put a strong light in front so I could see exactly why it was wrecking my drill bits, what was I doing wrong? Well, I found the grinding wheel was not firmly held down by the spring loaded twist-on retainer. I don't know if the retainer wasn't put on properly by the factory, or if the spring wasn't seated correctly... all I can say is I could spin it with my finger at first, then it was tight after I removed it and reinstalled it)Any way, the momentum of the wheel allowed it to start grinding each bit, then the wheel would stop in the mid turn of the drill bit, while the motor continued to turn full speed. It's quite loud, so there was no way to know this was going on without seeing it. The "tick" noise was cause by the shaft quickly spinning up the wheel when you finished the sharpening cycle of the bit and it pulled away. Of course every time the wheel was stopped, the shaft spinning it the middle of it ground some more metal away, making the wheel looser and looser, so the "tick" became a "twack". The wheel stopped sooner as it got looser, which is why the bits were becoming worse for me, not better, with practice, LOL. The bits were all sharpened with a backwards angle, because the wheel spinning would grind down the leading edge of the bit and then skid to a stop, leaving the heel of the bit intact.)So , I call the 800 number, nobody there. call again, left message with name and number, nobody returned the call. Left message with receptionist, nothing.I called pretty much every day, actually for well over a week. Left lots of messages. Receptionist left messages for them too. The receptionist was even saying "wow, nobody has phoned you back yet?? " after a week.Eventually, about 10 days later, I finally get a hold of somebody (note that they still hadn't returned a voicemail yet), and I explain it to them. They can't do anything about it, and all I get was another number to phone for the repair tech. sigh)So that guy only takes two days to get a hold of, and I explain it to him.All I wanted/expected was to send in my receipt (receipt dated about 15 days old now) and the wheel/retainer, which is now all stripped out, and get a new wheel and retainer on warranty (PS this machine is brand new). Nope. I have to mail the entire unit to them, they will "fix" it or send me a refurb. The guy says probably a refurb, since he isn't allowed to disassemble them in any way. (! The guy seems nice enough, and explains his hands are tied since Drill doctor won't mail him any parts either.Shipping the ENTIRE unit across the country costs almost twice than just going and buying the grinding wheel at a local store to begin with! Ugh. Phoned the original 800 number a bunch more times, nobody there, nobody phones back. Over a week later somebody actually calls me back (from the first voicemail I assume, 22 days prior), and the result is the same.No, I can't mail the screwed up wheel and retainer to them for warranty replacement. Mail the entire (brand new) unit in to Drill doctor (at my expense), and they'll ship you a refurb. They don't do "parts" at all, apparently.So, end result is, I bought a new wheel, fixed up the retainer a bit to properly hold it down, it works fine. Not "superb" or "like new" , but considerably better than hand sharpening for sure.My view of Drill Doctor as a company, and their customer support? I really *hope* I never need warranty again. That was a terrible experience. You really get the feeling that nobody really cares there, but the receptionist who unfortunately can't do a thing for you.Things break, that's a expected. And sometimes things are DOA, that's life. That's what warranty is for.But when your only warranty support is an 800 number with voicemail, and they can't be bothered to ever phone you back, that's really horrible.The fact that they won't send you a replacement part is not great either, but it was the total lack of customer service was the real disappointment here. Around 3 weeks waiting for them to return a voicemail was a bit extreme, while I have a brand new top of the line DOA Drill doctor sitting on my bench.I am giving two stars, since the machine works fine now, just like it's supposed to... but I can't give it more since it cost me several weeks of phoning, and 30 dollars out of my pocket to finally make it work, from brand new out of the box, and there is little to nothing for warranty support, parts, and customer service.- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -- - - - - - - - <UPDATE Nov 1, 2011> - - - - - - - - - -- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -< PS: Thanks commenters :- I AM just your typical DIY guy, not a shop, or a business... and your support is really appreciated, thank you :- >"Drill Doctor Marketing Guy" Matthew was true to his word in the comments section, and hooked me up with a very friendly Customer Service/Technical Support gal, Harmony, the following week after I emailed him.She very happily, rather than send parts to fix mine up, offered to simply replace my DD750x drill doctor with a current model. No kidding...There are a number of substantial things from my review that Drill Doctor has specifically addressed, which deserves an update.1 There are now real people manning the phones, and replying to emails. And friendly ones too. Their webpage ALSO has a direct link to Matthew's email right on the main page - Plus a web form to make a comment to the president of the company if you need to. I think there have been some tremendous efforts made here, to really grab hold of the concept of "customer service".2 On receipt of the replacement, the first thing I looked at - that loose springy clip-in retainer that caused the problem with the sharpening wheel in the first place... is gone! It is replaced by a screwed down retainer. And it is nice and solid - with two screws clamping the drum instead of the previous twisty/springy thing. Redesigned. Problem solved.3 Their web page Drill Doctor FAQ, first item, says "certain repair parts are available" now. I called specifically about that, *anonymously*, and it's true. Parts you can get at, IE *without opening the unit in any way*, are replaceable... and reasonably inexpensive. Thank you Drill Doctor !(Just for fun, I asked specifically to purchase a twist on springy wheel retainer too - as per the original problem. Nope. Sigh. Oh well, they still score 8/10 on that one, for at least offering latest revision parts.)Since the company has actually redesigned the problem part AND successfully worked very hard to improve every aspect of service I experienced,I'm pretty impressed right now with "new and Improved Drill Doctor"...both the company and the machine... and I'd not hesitate to recommend them to a friend..................... 2 Star ---> 5 Star ....................-- Randy- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

So I've been trying to get through my extensive collection of bits and I have put this thing to the test for a few weeks now constantly going through starting with my larger bits. Started with the3/4 because that's the largest it will except in the holder jig, and also made sure to have the additional 100grt wheel for the larger ones and after the first few days I decided to make a change and bounce down and work on the small sizes and man I had a lot more than I thought. They have gone much easier and quickly and not having a single issue. Zoomed through several hundred bits now and I am amazed at the condition of the Wheels, both the original 180 and the 100 i purchased appear as though I haven't even used them. Quality of the wheels obviously are great. Power of the motor can be tested on those big heavy bits and they are some very hard material. But I guess I have to share the few things I don't necessarily like, or thing's I believe could be a little better, especially since they have been manufacturing these for some time now and I think they have been content with what they have and decided to leave them alone, because I'm not seeing any real upgrades since the first model came out, possibly the overall power of the motor and I guess that's what I was actually most concerned about, but I can tell you there's no worries there. But small things from the design and fit of the little tray on the bottom you use for access to change or clean up the wheel. It's a poor fit, and from difficult to get open to also allowing way more of the metal dust it throws out the bottom and the sides. To the removable access to the side view you use for splitting the tip of a bit if you choose to go that route, which also blows constant dust out of the opening when you're not using it, but this is probably my biggest complaint about the entire thing. If you want to split the tips you need to do more than just jump from the normal sharpening process and like you have seen in videos where they sharpen a bit and take it directly to the side access to split it, but it's not properly lined up, it's not exactly a precision machine, and for straight up sharpening needs it functions for me just fine. I have to spend a lot of time with each bit if I'm splitting it from the holding jig i have to manually tweak the depth of the bit using nothing but visually putting it in and out of the side access and adjust it until you are not going to hit the Sharp edge of the bit and not go too far to the back of the edge and take chunks out of the bit leaving lots of burrs on them to clear up. I think it could certainly benefit from some possible upgrades to the adjustments and the slides that you adjust to go from 118 to 135 degrees is in need of some improvement, it can be really hard to move even after you loosen up the screw in the middle of your trying to get it changed. It hangs up somewhere and I can't see where. I think compared to the much more expensive machines that I would take this one every time, but I wish they would work on the fine tuning stuff, and simplify the overall design making it look like and function more like something you would put on your bench and leave on your bench and help keep your bit collection nice and sharp and not in the bag it comes with, and tucked away in a drawer somewhere and it gets pulled out once a year and you are not going to enjoy it as much, I would probably have zero complaints if it wasn't for the amount of bits I'm having to get through because I have procrastinated and I would like to have it benchtop constantly touching up my bits before I return them. This has been around long enough for it to be a little further refined and less moving it around to make adjustment, and constantly turning it from one side to the other, and make it more like a permanent piece for the shop and less like a portable sharpening device to take with you. It just needs someone to look at it and imagine it will be sitting in the shop for continuous access and easy to keep caught up. This is a good test for this thing, but still have to admit that it doesn't fail any tests, and I don't regret my purchase, but it was a tuff decision for me because I have so many bits that I use and have so much invested, I was serious about to purchase a machine for more than a thousand dollars and I don't think I would be unhappy with that. But I've been looking at these for some time and I thought it was a good idea to get this one for the value, and I could have passed it over to my son in his own shop if I could see a reason to spend that much more money, and I have to be honest, I think I made a great choice and I would recommend it to anyone.

Well built easy to use and set up. If your a mechanic like me you find that at some point all your bits need sharpened.. It has saved me a ton of money. Sharpens the bits perfectly I'm glad I bought this