The drill smokes from the body area when drilling, but does work. Should i take it in for repair or can i do something myself?

It sounds like the governor on the generator is not working or something is holding the throttle wide open. That would cause the generator to produce too much voltage for the drill. The armature in the drill has likely been toasted. That's what caused the smoke. The drill may have a short in the windings and some of the plates may even have been melted off the commutator.
It sounds to me like the drill may need its armature rebuilt or the drill may need a new armature. The outer windings may be affected as well. Just before the drill started smoking, I would guess the drill was running faster than normal.

So what is your question. It sounds like you have a bad battery so try it on another tool. If it works then the drill is not working or assembled properly if the same thing happens then you have ruled put the drill and there is a proplem with the battery

Yes this does have brushes, they are mounted on plastic plate that has to be soldered onto the switch. That noise might be the vanes that have broken off the main rotor. If you open it up you will be able to see. Yes they can be repaired but check with the milwaukee agent for cost. Some times it is more cost effective to buy a body only. Brush card is cheap about nine pound inc vat.

Hi, these units tend to heat up over extended use. It is possible that your brushes have worn down and need to be replaced. The contact area around the commutator, (where the brushes push against), should be cleaned gently with ultra fine steel wool. Also, the gaps between the contact points of the commutator should be free of any conductive dust left behind by your dying brushes. Since the drill needs to be disassembled in order to do this, check any connections for weakness and any more conductive dust that may be shorting something. good luck.

Check electrical contacts in drill body where battery connects. Check wiring inside the drill, trigger and check also brushes. You do not have to invest 329, you can buy "body only" machine for few bucks and reuse your charger and battery packs. Juraj

Time to crack it open and have a look at the brushes at the back of the motor, they may be worn down to nothing or contaminated with something that spilled on the drill.

I would contact the nearest service center and buy some new brushes for they are very inexpensive.

Cheers,

Kevin

When an AC motor is stalled, very high currents pass through the motor windings and melt the insulation on the windings; the smoke was the result of the motor winding insulation being melted. This causes a reduction in motor torque and premature failure.

You should suggest that your neighbor buy you a new drill and he keep the one that he ruined.

With the DeWalt cordless drills, the weak link is that the leads tend to burn (melt) off at the motor brushes when the drill is overloaded. It's happened to mine now about 3-4 times, so much so I've had to replace the wires after they got too short to put a new terminal back on them!

The only other issue is that the trigger mechanism could have failed due to the hevy load of drilling in concrete. But before you spend the bucks on that, you can easily check to see if it's the wiring or the trigger assembly.

Before you take anything apart, make sure the top speed selector is at #1, and the torque setting set to the lowest setting. (makes it easier to remember if you have the speed selector come out of the drill body)

Now lay the drill on it's side and with the battery out of the tool, remove all the screws that hold the two halves together. Take off the top half and look at the back end of the tool to see if the wires going to the motor are in good condition and not burned off the motor brush tabs. If they are, you can either resolder them or recrimp them (DeWalt used different methods for different models) with a new .25 female terminal (any auto or hardware store will have them)

You can give the repair a quick check (IF you are careful) by putting in the battery into the lower drill body and holding the drill motor, gently squeeze the trigger and see if the tool runs. If so, you've fixed it and can put the drill back together.

If the wires are good, then it's the trigger assembly and you'll have to get one from either a DeWalt Authorized service center or distributor that carries repair parts, as these are sealed units and can't be fixed (I've tried). There are some available online too, if you wish to do the replacement yourself, which is a straight forward unplug and plug operation, now that the tool is apart.

Reassemble, making sure the speed selector is in the slots on the tool body and everything else lines up correctly. Install the screws and you're back in business.

Hope you find this very helpful and best regards!

I agree. Did you have a question?

You have burned out the drill motor, it is shorted, the battery smoked due to a direct short, one thing I don't understand why the thermal limiter didn't trip in battery pack, I would contact manufacturer and try to get hem to buy you a new drill.