Side by Side Comparison of: Robert Larson vs Schroeder

You can tell by looking, this is a drill for applications requiring stability and control of movement but, also, for those of us who have trouble using an electric drill. I always tilt to one side, due to arthritis I developed as a child. This allows me to be productive, in my home, doing chores I would otherwise have to outsource, but at a slower pace than if I used an electric drill. That is invaluable to me, as a person who is always tinkering and fixing things and who hates spending money I don't have to pay someone to do something I believe I should be able to do myself.

The device itself, a hand drill, also called a manual drill, is the perfect type. The handle is nice, solid wood, with a metal gear plate running along the metal gear-edged housing for the drill bit. Standard bits fit. The little dial/turn handle is easy to turn. And, in what may be the best feature for me, with my hands being what they are, Schroeder has kept to the old tradition of using a wooden handle that is long, which extends off the end of the metal unit, rather than the new style of turning downward.

There is an odd movement in the manufacturing of new "old things", which has been developing over the last couple of decades. We see terrible redesigns hitting the market all the time, as though reinventing the wheel makes sense. These hand drills, unfortunately, are often made with a gun-style grip, turned and aimed downward from the drill. Now that style of grip certainly looks nice, seems appealing, but, in the reality of use, a down-turned grip makes it difficult to hold this type of unit while you are drilling, given how long it can take to drill, by forcing you to hold the unit in a position that can start to hurt your wrist. This wonderful unit, being straight, allows you to hold it with your fist, thumb at the back end, pinky-finger gripping around the top of the handle, up near the metal parts, which results in aiming the unit easily and being able to press it, harder, against the wall or piece of wood, without hurting your wrist or fingers. Try to remember, if you can, the joy of eating food with a spoon sticking out between your thumb and forefinger, the handle held in your fist, how easy it was, how comfortable, before the world told you to start contorting your fingers in compliance with the conventional etiquette of silverware usage. This feels like that, easy, comfortable, safe, controlled and natural.

The Schroeder is the best I have found, just like my grandfather's little drill from the twenties, and it allows me to do the job carefully, correctly and without hurting my joints. Good luck in finding what you need and what will get the job done.

This tool was made in China, so if you have any concerns in that regard. I am using it for light construction tasks, for which it appears to be very well suited.

Great little drill, similar to the one Grandma had. I tend to put off projects that involve drilling a hole since I can never seem to find my drill when it's needed, then when it reappears the battery is dead, then when the battery is charging I get distracted by some other shiny object. This little guy can fit in my tool bag so I know where it is. I put up a small shelf unit using it and it took only a few minutes. Wish I'd bought one long ago!

Like any hand drill you have to pick it up a bit to relieve pressure. It works great for me as an adult, but I bought this in the hopes that my 5 year old could use it. I think about the time she is 8 this will be great, but for now it is just too cumbersome and frustrating. However, she loves it and gives it a mighty effort.

it works ok

Used in my collection of tools

Excellent tool. You get what you pay for is true with this tool.

Great quality !! I recommend going with this size so that you can handle both 5/16" and 1/4" drills.

It has a keyless chuck. Sometimes that's good. Not here. If you use this as a screwdriver, any strong torque you put on this will loosen the chuck making your bit at least not turn the screw and at worst--fall out. Also, the long handle opposite the chuck end, has a tendency to come loose. It's simply screwed into the tool so if the tool rotates as you turn the crank, the handle will unscrew. Honestly, this is simply ridiculous! This is a reasonably expensive drill boasting that legendary German engineering...and it's pretty much a joke to use as a screw driver. Granted, it was not marketed as a drill/driver and it doesn't serve well as a screw driver.So use it as a drill only. I just used this drill tonight to drill 9 pilot holes for screws of varying sizes (so I used a couple of different drill bits). As a drill, this tool worked very well. It was easy to align and easy to hold. Using a "egg beater" style drill like this takes a bit of practice to get the hang of it. Because you are applying torque to only one side of the drill, it's easy to wiggle the drill as you use it causing your hole not to be straight. Once you have that skill down, this drill works just fine for drilling into anything that is relatively soft. Drilling into metal, concrete/brick, or very hard dense wood may be quite challenging because it can get extremely hard to turn the crank. Even so, this drill works just fine AS A DRILL. Again, don't even bother considering this for a screw driver! To put it plainly, it sucks as a screw driver Also, it should go without saying that this is a manual tool so you need fairly strong hands to use it. If you don't have strong hands or you have an injury to your hand or wrist, it'll be hard to use this.Would I buy this drill again? Not sure; maybe not. For the money, you can find some really great, reputable vintage/antique manual drills on eBay. At the time of this writing, this drill is selling for over $50. That's WAY over priced for what you get! I guess you're paying for that "German Engineering".Also, because of the weaknesses that this has when used as a screw driver and the hand/wrist strength needed to use this, it could be frustrating for a kid to use.UPDATE: Well, I'm not quite sure what I was doing wrong before when using this as a screw driver, but last night, I put a Phillips head bit in it and let my wife use it to a re-upholstery project she was doing. The Schroeder zipped those screws out of the bench seat very quickly and the chuck never loosened once! Perhaps I hadn't used it enough to "wear the new off it" before I formed my opinion about it as a screw driver. It worked well last night as a screw driver both to remove and to insert screws into a bench. I have also used it for several drilling jobs around the house and it works perfectly as a drill. It's light weight, tight (no wobble or looseness, and steady. I've raised my opinion to 5 stars.

Lets face it, this item is a bit of a novelty. You can buy a power drill for less money which will do everything you want to do. However this is just way more fun than the power tool. It really is amazing how well this can drill through plastic, wood, or even metal. Even at shockingly low RPM a small drill bit will go right into whatever you want.I did some basic testing on this drill. Every time you turn the wheel, the drill bit spins four times. I decided to go all out and spin it as fast as I can. I was able to spin the wheel 24 times in 10 seconds. This works out to the bit rotating at nearly 600 RPM.This has some uses for powering other devices. I actually bought it because I was building a simple hand crank generator. To really get the generator to work well it requires a belt, pulley, or chain to get higher RPM. While that would still be ideal, it is a lot of work to actually construct that. Instead this can be hooked up to a shaft producing similar results. I suspect I could even power a small home-made hand crank Van De Graff generator with it, although I have not yet tried.While the drill appears to be well made, it is really quite odd that there is not a second gear connected to the large gear for support. The frame even has an intentional space for this second gear, but the gear is absent. In the short run, this gear isn't really needed because it runs just fine on the one it has. I suspect over time the large gear will come loose since it is only supported on one side though. Amazon does not yet sell it, but this same company makes a model which sells for about twice as much which appears to have this feature along with better handles(the handle on the side of this model is just too small). Another issue is that while the two stationary handles are wooden, the handle that you actually spin is plastic. I don't know that it is an issue, but it sure looks like a piece which won't last long. Really though, I don't use a drill enough to justify the additional cost of the better drill. With how well this is made I am not even sure that it makes sense to buy this model rather than the one half its price. For my use it probably would suffice.

Works as it should.

Seems like it's good quality. I have to admit the tool itself was smaller then the old broken hand drill of unknown brand I was replacing. The thing that opens and holds the drill bits will hold all the sizes I usually use. I'm not sure how well this will hold up for the next 40+ years but hopefully everything will prove to be sturdy and long lasting.

I find hand drills like this to be very useful for fine work, hitting exactly your spot and drilling to a controlled depth. However, this one is a bit of a disappointment; the drive wheel is too small and the crank handle too short to give good leverage for drilling into hard woods. I have a couple of these from the first half of the twentieth century that are much better, even though they are quite worn. Bigger wheel, longer handle, more powerful and therefore easier to control.

Schroeder makes a good quality hand drill, it works well for what it is intended for, but it is much smaller than what I was expecting. The 9 1/4 total inches includes the handle with the chuck unscrewed as far as possible. We also bought a Schroder Heavy-Duty 1/2-inch Rotary Breast Hand Drill at Sears for 55 dollars, which we use more than this smaller one. Unfortunately Amazon does not currently list this larger two-gear model with a chest plate and large hand grip. With that said, for those who want a small, good quality, light-weight hand-powered drill, this is the best units that we could find for under 30 dollars.

I discovered several large hand drills at a garage sale, bought them and have been discovering the surprising benefits of using the 'armstrong' drills ever since. I wanted a smaller size so I got this one, chosen over a couple of others due to price and faith in German made tools. I've used it to drill 1/8"holes through 12 ga. copper sheet stock with astonishing ease. I've also used it with a 1/4" bit to enlarge the diameter of pieces of bamboo that was really not much larger...a procedure that required considerable control. Trying the same thing with a cordless power drill always shattered the bamboo's side walls. I also found centering a drill bit and starting a hole exactly where I wanted it without a pilot hole or punch very easy to do.The drill seems well made, decent materials, smooth operation, the chuck works smoothly, etc. The ONLY problem is that bits don't insert very deeply into the Chuck, so regular sized drill bits seem to extend out really far which gives them the feeling of being slightly wobbly when in use. It's like they're not supported rigidly enough...a greater percentage of their length needs to be clamped in the jaws of the chuck. I'm going to look around for a small set of short bits. I think a set of 2 " long bits would be good. And even with this going on using this provided far more control than power tools. Now I just need a mid-sized unit. Very pleased.

Like most of the things I buy online, this was for my classroom. It wasn't the cheapest hand drill, but wasn't the most expensive either, and I love the sturdy metal construction. It was really built to last. The wooden handle is very comfortable to hold and fits well into little hands (my students). I was a little worried that it wouldn't have the power to go through hard wood, but I was wrong. So far we have used it to drill holes in oak, maple and red bud (a very hard red-bed) and the kiddos have had no complaints. The only thing I wish was different is the chuck is a turn type and is hard for the little ones to use without pinching fingers on the gears, so I have to do that for them, and because it is a screw to tighten chuck sometimes it becomes lose when they back up out of a drilled hole. Other than that I am looking forward to a few years of classroom wood working with these little beauties.

Great otherwise, very solid. Too much torque could strip the gears, though. Would not be ideal for drilling into metal.

Good tool.

While reasonably well made, this hand drill is just too small for general household or workshop use. Since new hand drills are not readily available anymore, I recommend going to eBay or similar site and searching for "vintage eggbeater hand drill" and picking up a used double pinion hand drill from 1930's thru 1960's in good condition. There are plenty of more substantial old hand drills available for a similar price than you will find looking for a new product.

Knocked a start off bc it came slightly damaged in the mail... poor packing. And another star off bc the you can't put a bit in the chuck very far. Maybe 1/2"

Doesn't turn that easily.

This tool is smaller than it looks and not really what I expected for $31 dollars. It does what its advertised for but, I suspect there are better buys for the money.

That little plastic turning handle seems quite insufficient for drilling with. I'm affraid it's gonna break on me when I need it most and cut my hand. Other than than it seems well made.

Wrong item I received it.

Not what I expected, I thought it would have been more of a real tool, for what it cost.Will keep it for the grandkids.

This drill is pretty small, it is OK for drilling 1/8" diameter holes but it does not perform well with 1/4" bits.

The gears jam with even light downward pressure on the hand crank, something difficult to avoid when you're working. It became worse over time, across 3 small projects with minimal usage. It's basically useless to me now--as soon as I really get cranking, so to speak, it freezes solid. I'm an amateur only doing very simple projects, but I never abuse my tools, and I know when something isn't working properly. And, FWIW, I'm drilling maple, not plastic or metal.The problem seems to be a combination of the shape of the crank wheel or inconsistency of the depth of the teeth (only the teeth on one side appear to jam), combined with too much play along the drive shaft axis (the gears slide across each other too much). I read on another forum that there may have been a bad run of these tools, and I guess I was an unlucky winner. But the manufacturing defects surely don't give me much confidence.I recently visited an Ace Hardware in Malaysia of all places and discovered a Stanley-branded double-pinion hand drill. It had significantly less play along the driving axis. I never purchased it, though, so maybe it would have become unusable, too. Nevertheless, I would recommend buying a double-pinion drill, as they're not much more money but seem to have better tolerances, almost by necessity. If a double-pinion drill had as much play along the drive axis as my single-pinion Schroeder, the top gear might not engage at all.The Stanley-branded drill looked exactly like the 3/4" Schroeder hand drill. The 3/4" Schroeder is widely marketed as a single-pinion drill, but I'm fairly certain that's an error in the marketing literature from the OEM, unless I'm misunderstanding what pinion means. The 3/4" must be double-pinion. Heck, in some pictures you can even see the two pinions.I'm also convinced that many of these hand drills, including Schroeder, Malaysian-region Stanley, and some others, are the exact same design, perhaps even being sourced from the same supplier. The only differences appear to be in the type of handle attached to the cranking wheel--plastic or wood.

This is a very solid drill, but the torque needed to drive it has in a short period caused a slight offset in the pin that the crank rides on, to the point where it causes the whole thing to bind up and seize. It's nice to have a quiet, nighttime drill, but you'll likely be better off getting one that is a single solid piece with a standard chuck.

gears are sloppy, binds and makes it hard to keep straight. I much prefer a brace.this would work in a pinch. if it did not have so much slop in it, it would be good for small detail stuff.

When applying more force, cog wheels get 'unsynchronized'. I mean, orange wheel is not fixed very well, thus cogs pop out sometimes and drilling is seizes.

It's very flimsy, the famous German quality is no longer what it used to be 50 years ago. I bought this "tool" for my 6 year old son, who cannot yet handle power tools. It's kind of OK for him, but the handle needs to be re-tightened quite often, otherwise it just unscrews itself (the handle is screwed in to allow making the tool shorter, probably for shipping, because it makes no sense to constantly be disassembling the tool at home). The chuck is keyless, and as a result you cannot really tighten the drill bit properly - several times the bit got stuck in wood and fell out of the chuck. After a single day of use, the wooden handles are scratched in multiple places and the color is off, and we didn't really do anything to the handles, except laying the tool on the table between the uses. This tool seemed to have better reviews than other comparable ones, so it's not clear if there is a better option. BTW, you can buy this drill at Sears for less than a half of the Amazon price ($25-$30).

Amendment written 2/16/2008===========================I see that the Peck Tool Company has changed the description of this drill from "Heavy Duty" to "Standard Duty." Judged against this different description, my opinion is that this drill is a five-star product. I say this because there is probably not a not a better quarter-inch hand drill manufactured today. Indeed, I would not have returned it if I did not already have a quarter-inch single-pinion hand drill (bought about 45 years ago) in my tool collection. In all fairness, a quarter-inch drill as sturdy as this one doesn't need the second pinion unless you expect to abuse it and yet have it survive for use by your grandchildren.For a 3/8-inch chuck, the second pinion becomes more necessary. But don't buy a larger chuck than you need. A 1/4-inch chuck is difficult to find, and will fit into places where a larger one will not.It's too bad there isn't a common description that fits between "Standard Duty" and "Heavy Duty." The quality of this drill is well above "Standard." You will not be disappointed with it for any normal use.(I have changed the title of this review. I would also change the number of stars I have posted--but if there is a way to do so, I cannot find it).Original review follows for reference=====================================If you want a reasonably sturdy hand drill for light-duty use around the house, this drill will meet or exceed your needs. But if you are a trade-person who intends daily use of this drill for decades, you will be disappointed.An ordinary "eggbeater" hand drill has two gears--the driving gear which you turn with a hand crank, and the driven or "pinion" gear, which is attached to and rotates the chuck. When the drill is used, the force transmitted through the gears tends to push the driving and pinion gears apart at their point of engagement, causing the driving gear to tilt on its axle. In the extreme case, the axle will bend, allowing the gears to disengage.In a more robust design, a second pinion gear is mounted to the frame at a point directly opposite the pinion that drives the chuck. This second pinion gear also engages the driving gear and rotates as the driving gear turns. Otherwise, it is connected to nothing.The sole--but very important--function of the second pinion gear is to support the driving gear at a point opposite the pinion connected to the chuck. This prevents the driving gear from tilting, and removes the bending force from the driving-gear axle.From the price, the item description, and indeed from close inspection of the illustration, I believe it is reasonable to expect this drill to be the more sturdy, two-pinion, design. Alas, it is not.This drill is designed so that the frame could accept a second pinion, but it is absent. There is only an empty space where this second pinion and its axle could be. Thinking the lack of the second pinion to be an accidental and unusual omission from the assembly, I called the United States vendor, for whom this was a new item. (I may have bought the first one they sold). The vendor checked remaining stock, and found their others to be the same. They quickly agreed to accept the return of the drill, and immediately refunded my total cost including the cost of return shipping.I've happily given the Vendor a five-star rating.This drill does have a fine-quality chuck. If it were described as a light-duty drill, or as a precision drill, and if the frame were not designed to accept a second pinion yet did not have one, I could give this product a higher rating. But when I compare the "heavy-duty" description to the actual construction of the drill, two stars is the most generous I can be.

This hand drill broke during the first time using it.

Sending it back...Product actually contains lead, and has a warning to wash hands after use...In what world would my hand tools be toxic to the user..Garbage

not what I expected. Very small and hard to use, can easily pinch your fingers in the mechanism. I expected better from a german made tool.

Very gentle use just countersinking holes for drills. I might have drilled 15 holes before it broke and will no longer turn. Would not recommend.

Chuck can't be tightened enough to keep from spinning uselessly around the bit. I was able to drill less than a quarter of an inch into a piece of alder before the drill stopped working and the bit was left in the wood, stuck tight, with no way to be removed that wouldn't ruin the partly drilled hole. I'm still looking for an acceptable hand drill.

I love to use manual tools. I had a hand drill for many years and sadly it broke. I had high hopes for this. It won't hold a bit. I have to remove bits from the wall by hand when the drill loses it's grip