Makita does not actually make all their cordless motors, nor does any other tool manufacturer. Makita's 10.8v compact lithium tools, and some of the 18v LXT tools such as the BDF453H drill/driver use motors manufactured by other companies such as Mabuchi. Most of Makita's older 9.6v and 12v tools also used non-serviceable can motors from outside manufacturers. Most DeWalt cordless tools that have replaceable brushes, and all that have frameless motors use DeWalt designed and built motors. The 12v Max tools use Mabuchi can motors and some of the earlier DeWalt cordless without replaceable brushes use Johnson can motors. Back in the early '90s DeWalt was one of the first to offer cordless tools with replaceable brushes that were built "in-house" while nearly all others were using Mabuchi or Johnson. Actually, DeWalt's parent company Black & Decker, was the first to design and manufacture their own fully serviceable and frameless motors in their industrial line of cordless starting back in the 1980s, some of which carried over into the DeWalt line.
Thanks for the reply, I was asking because I am on my fourth DCD985 hammerdrill. This one seems to work well, exchanged all the others. 2 of them had some pretty bad run out on the chucks and one had a problem with the brake engaging when it shouldn't have. So far the dcf885 impact driver has been great. If Dewalt did a little better with their quality control over in Mexico they would have an awesome cordless drill. I liked the feel of the drill so much I gave Dewalt a FOURTH chance on this one, Thought I should mention all 3 drills had the same date code, as does this one which seems to work perfectly so far, unlike the others. Aside from that, I like the tools quite a bit aside from the crappy belt clip! They could improve on that design a bit.
