Grinders are a very useful tool. They allow you to quickly cut metal and grind concrete, plus a ton of other applications. You can buy a variety of different sizes of grinders with a couple of common sizes, one being a 7″ grinder. As you would expect, a 7″ grinder requires a lot of power, power once only supplied by a cord. Well not anymore. Makita has a cordless 7″ grinder available, so let’s jump into the Makita Cordless Grinder Review.
There are a ton of power tool manufacturers who sell grinders, but the one thing I have noticed is you have to be careful. While corded grinders can pretty much do everything you throw at them, cordless grinders are a little different. Some cordless grinders will cut out when grinding as they can’t handle the job. So when you buy a cordless grinder, always make sure you know what task you will be throwing at it and make sure the grinder can keep up.
Makita Cordless Grinder Review Overview
There are a lot of different sized grinders available on the market. Most are 4.5″ or 5″ which work most of the time. However, there are times where you have a bigger job and need a bigger grinder like a 7″. The 7″ grinder is going to allow you to perform more work in less time such as removing more metal or concrete faster.
A 7″ grinder is a monster of a grinder. This is great for removing material fast but also requires more power. So when we heard about the Makita 7″ grinder, we were a little surprised since this will require lots of power.
Makita Cordless Grinder Review Features
The Makita 7″ XAG12PT1 Grinder comes with more than just the grinder. You get a bag, disks, batteries, charger and two guards.
Here is the one thing I am loving about Makita, their battery set up. While most manufacturers decide to introduce a new battery line, Makita isn’t. They aren’t forcing the user to buy new batteries as everything is working off their 18V battery.
The Makita Grinder uses 2-18V batteries, making this a 36v grinder. How cool is this? You get all the power, but don’t have to have a separate battery platform.
Makita designed the grinder around a brushless motor which allows this to be more efficient and have longer run times. The motor delivers 7,800 rpms. The tool features a soft start and electric brake. In case the tool jerks or stops suddenly, the motor will shut down.
Makita has a consistent speed monitoring system. The tool will automatically monitor the work and adjust the speed and torque for the application.
While a 7″ grinder is large, the handle isn’t. Makita has a nice rubber grip and it’s the perfect size to wrap your hand around the handle and control the tool.
Makita designed an absorbing back handle. The back handle is isolated from the motor housing which reduces vibrations.
Makita uses a paddle switch to operate the grinder. Just depress the safety switch on the bottom of the paddle and you can then pull the paddle to start the grinder.
The spindle lock is located in the traditional spot, on the front and top of the tool.
The side handle can screw onto the left or right-hand side of the grinder. The wheel guard doesn’t need a tool to adjust the angle and it’s easy to swap out each guard.
Both batteries sit on the back of the tool to help even out the balance of the tool. The batteries are protected by a metal cage.
To protect the motor, Makita implemented a screen to keep dust and debris away from the motor.
Makita Cordless Grinder Review Performance
I am doing a ton of work to my house. We took off a back room and there was a bunch of Rebar protruding above the concrete. I wanted to cut them off for safety reasons. Sure I could use my smaller grinder, but when you have a 7″? I think it’s pretty obvious that the grinder handles this task without any issues.
I did notice that this grinder has very low vibrations. Another item that stood out was the balance of the tool. While the tool weighs about 11 lbs, it sure didn’t feel like it when I was using it at different angles.
I love the soft start up and the electronic brake. Besides safety reasons, it just makes the tool feel so much better.
Okay, I know Makita touts this for grinding and cut off, but I wanted to try it on concrete. Now your runtime will drop if using it on concrete, but we still have to give it a shot.
We installed a Makita 7″ diamond blade. All I can say is it’s like a hot knife through butter. This eats concrete without any issues.
We are giving this to a local contractor who has a garage job where he has a bunch of cracks to fix before they seal the floor. Follow us on Instagram and see how well it works. I am sure it will do great, but curious about the runtime with an application like that.
Makita Cordless Grinder Review Value
If you look at corded grinders, you can see that most of them are about $200 to $250. The Makita XAG12PT1 is $400 on The Home Depot website. So you are paying about $150 to $200 more to lose the cord.
If you are using a 7″ all day every day, you will still have to stick with a corded version. But if you need a 7″ cordless grinder, the extra cost is worth it and not a bad price considering everything Makita gives, which includes the batteries and charger.
Makita Cordless Grinder Final Thoughts
Who would have thought it would be possible to run a 7″ grinder on batteries and actually get some serious work done? Makita did an awesome job with this grinder as it’s powerful, plus you don’t have to mess with a cord. Anyone looking to lose the cord and needs a big grinder, well I think you know where you should turn, the Makita XAG12PT1.
Another tool that is on my short list to try out sometime. I am on the fence about the paddle style switch though. I think that I would prefer to have a regular trigger switch like on their old rat tail grinders that could be locked on. Seems like if you were grinding for longer periods and needed to shift your grip on the tool that the paddle style would cause a momentary cutout and soft restart delay.
I am somewhat surprised that along with the 9″ cordless grinder, as well as this one, that Makita has not also released a cordless, variable speed 7″ polisher at the same time. IMO, it would be a perfect match up.
Good point. Will be interesting to see what they come out with in the near future.
i am guessing this newer model does have the buzz kill feature earlier Makita grinders had that if you pushed the grinder ( loaded it down ) it would shut down i have almost a 1st model Makita grinder with that feature and want to throw it in the pond it is so worthless of course with out the battery LOL
Agree, Milwaukee and others did the same thing. Very annoying. I feel like the manufacturers have gotten better and more power where it doesn’t do that like it use to.