When Dan told me we were going to review some Ryobi stuff, I have to admit I was pretty excited. While I really like their older 18V Ni-Cad tools, I don’t have much experience with their new Lithium line. Then he told me we would be reviewing the 18V fan. While I thought it might be cool, I wasn’t as excited. I did a little research and found out it was $25 which is pretty inexpensive, well not compared to a $10 box fan I could buy. Anyways I thought it would be cool, but just one of those items that sits around on my shelf and hardly ever gets used.
If I knew then what I know now, I would have been very excited about getting this fan. I know it’s just a fan, but this thing is awesome. Since I have opened the box a couple weeks ago, this has been running non stop. Even as I sit here writing this article, I have it on and pointed at me. Right now it’s about 85° outside and not ready to turn on the air conditioner yet since it will dip down into the 60’s tonight.
The first thing I noticed after taking it out of the box was how small and lightweight the unit is. Then looking at it closer, I noticed this wasn’t some cheap plastic flimsy fan. The face was solid and the plastic was sturdy. I didn’t try this, but I bet it could get hit pretty hard with something and not even crack it. Even the frame of the fan had ribs inside to make it stronger. I could tell this was a well thought out product, not something that was just tossed together to make a quick profit. The base is nice and wide to also provide support. The fan will rotate 90° from facing forward to rotating up using one of 6 click positions. According to Ryobi this can run 10+ hours on low with one battery, which I didn’t test but I can believe it. I have been running it on speed 2 and get over 7 hours of run time. I have been remodeling my bathroom and have been using it to circulate air to help dry Thin Set, paint, mud, primer and more.
After using this for a while, I realized how important this fan would be to a lot of people. It has two ways to hang the fan for any worker in a spot who needs air movement. It even has a way to mount this fan for those people who work in their truck or van and need a little more air movement. On the back there is a nice carrying handle to make transporting this fan a lot easier.
Now while the fan has a lot of cool things and well thought out ideas, what good is the fan if it’s loud or doesn’t move a lot of air? The fan is pretty quiet on speed 1. Speed 2 is a little more noisy, but you can still sit right next to it and hold a conversation without any problems. For the size of the fan, it moves a lot of air. Don’t expect it to blow off your toupee, but it does an awesome job for the size of the fan. I was really surprised by the amount of air this small fan pushes.
Overall this is worth every penny. The fan is solid and lightweight. While the fan has a small housing assembly, it pumps out a lot of air. This would be great for anyone looking for a small portable fan. From your DIY to your professionals.
Great writeup Dan! That Looks like a good fan for a workbench.
Great review as always!
It’s a nice looking fan, and I would love to have a cordless workshop fan, but the cost for at least one battery and a charger would be far more than I’m willing to pay. Something like this would only be good if you already had some of the Ryobi One+ tools. For a fan, it’s just not worth it.
Thanks for the review Eric. That is a very good price. If it was dewalt or Milwaukee it would be $50 or $75. How much are the batteries? Btw your tiling looks good. I did my first tiling last weekend. The one step from the kitchen to the garage took four hours. :-[
Tiling can take a long time. That’s awesome you did it yourself. I just looked on HD site and saw the battery for $75. I really can’t believe how much I use this fan and how nice it is.
COOL LIKE IT.
Great review looks very nice. And for the price its almost a no brainer to buy it.
Home Depot has some good deals on Ryobi tools with batteries and chargers right now. It’s a cheaper way to buy into the One plus system than just buying the bare tool a charger and battery.
Is there still a way to plug it in and not use a battery?
Sorry John this fan only works with Ryobi One Plus batteries it has no ac outlet plug on it. Sorry Dan I forgot to add the link to the Deals at Home Depot on my previous comment.
http://slickdeals.net/permadeal/95478/home-depot-ryobi-one-18v-lithiumion-tools-drill-and-impact-driver-combo-kit-94-cordless-electric-string-trimmer-and-edger
cool fan…wish others make one..hint hint milwaukee red
fan.maybe someday…..good job
Ryobi.makita has one.Ryobi last longer on battery.no
battery on Ryobi or makita.guess be hot for sometime.
Sounds pretty cool. Be nice if it had an 110V option though.
Yea I really wish some of the Ryobi tools made it over to the Milwaukee brand. I know they don’t want to have people think its been cheapened to a diy quality tool, but they have some really cool stuff like the spotlight and fan. The spotlight has been handy to check for damage after severe storms and when my neighbors garage caught on fire.
For the ac/dc adaptor dewalt had one for the 24v ( thats why i keep the circular saw and recip saw ) and Hitachi had one for the 18v. The makita fan is 80$ here in Canada
Just bought this fan. It’s ok. The larger battery works better only thing I don’t
like about it the on and off button should be on the front not the back.
Reaching over the top of the fan to change settings can be difficult at times.
Makes a loud buzzing noise when on low setting I tried ryobi chat for a solution but they wanted me to put in credit card information on the site for an answer. Not happening! I’ll just return it and get a different brand since no one will help me find a solution