Tool Box Buzz

Milwaukee M18 Fuel Blower 2728-21HD Review

With increased runtime, efficient fans and powerful motors, cordless blowers are becoming more and more popular.

Cordless leaf blowers have always been designated for people who have small yards, or do light work like blowing leaves and debris from flowerbeds, sidewalks and driveways. The best thing that people like about cordless blowers is that they are portable,  and there is no gas, oil, spark plugs  or extension cords to deal with.

As a homeowner we all know what to use a blower for, but where the cordless blower has shined is at the job site.

I’ll start by saying that I have had a few gas blowers over the last 18 years. I store in my tool trailer and use them on the following  job site applications:

• Cleaning a work spaces, crawlspaces, the bed of my truck or my trailer.
• Cleaning concrete forms before pouring
• Cleaning off subfloors before snapping lines, nailing or layout
• Cleaning out clogged drain pipes and dryer vents
• Cleaning fins on AC compressors
• Cleaning off woodworking tools before putting them away – especially PVC dust.
• Any many, many more applications

Why Not Less Maintenance?

Cordless blowers are quieter, odorless, and nearly maintenance free. Because they are emission free you can use them inside a building without concern. On the other hand, gas powered blowers require lots of service including gas/oil fuel mixtures, filters, spark plugs and pull cord issues. Cordless blowers eliminate much of the maintenance and they are quieter and odorless.

Milwaukee M18 Fuel Blower

I recently started using the Milwaukee M18 Fuel Blower 2728-21HD.  It weighs 8.1 pounds, was designed with a brushless motor, and comes with a 9.0 Ah high demand battery. This M18 blower is rated to give you 20-minutes of continuous runtime. This blower is fully system compatible with Milwaukees other 125 cordless M18 tools. It will run on any Milwaukee battery but will give you the best runtime with the 9.0 Ah battery.

Milwaukee claims that their blower will clear debris 15 foot away. While many of the better competitors can also accomplish this, they need to be placed on “turbo or boast” mode.  This requires the user to push an additional button, adding hand fatigue, and also puts a significant drain on runtime.

Are you Invested in a Battery Platform?

I only have so much space in my tool trailer, and thus try to stick to two cordless battery platforms: Dewalt and Milwaukee.

I have many different brand tools, and truly believe a Pro contractor cant do what they do with only one tool brand. That said, I DO spend a considerable effort trying to stick to my two platforms.

I have always advocated to folks, especially when starting out, to invest in a tool platform that you can afford and then expand on it.

Having a cordless blower in my trailer that is compatible to one of my two cordless platforms is a win! I’ll never run out of “gas,” I mean batteries since I have a half dozen or more.

Milwaukee M18 Fuel Blower Features

The M18 blower is a no-nonsense, simple-stupid tool to use.  It features a variable speed trigger and a switch, called “cruise control,” allows the blower to be set to a desired power output, so the operating hand can be relaxed reducing fatigue. That’s it – nothing else.The ambidextrous cruise control

It’s fairly well balanced and durable enough to endure being tossed around in the back of a truck.

Milwaukee M18 Fuel Blower Specifications

• Max Air Volume   450 CFM
• Max Air Speed      100 MPH
• Noise Rating         63 decibels [ANSI 50’ from operator]
• Length                 38.5”
• Weight                 5.7 lbs bare or 8.1 lbs with 9.0 Ah battery

How Loud Is the M18 Fuel Blower?

Milwaukee M18 Fuel Blower is rated at 63 decibels, 50-feet from the operator [ANSI standard] and 86 Decibels if held ear level.  The OSHA limit for an 8 hr exposure is 90dB without hearing protection.  NIOSH and others recommend anything above 85dB should use hearing protection.

Let’s Talk Fans

the fan intake on this blower in in the rear of the blower, unlike some competitors who locate it to the side. Intake on the side of the blower end up sucking in the users panda, shirt or jacket.

The Milwaukee M8 blower uses an axial fan design to move air. An axial fan uses fan blades to force air to move parallel to the shaft about which the blades rotate, in a linear direction. Axial fans are similar in theory to a windmill and are named for the direction of the airflow they create. Blades rotating around an axis draw air in parallel to that axis and force air out in the same direction.

Using the M18 Fuel Blower

When we first took the M18 blower out we tried it on wet leaves, pine needle and pine cones. These three in my opinion are the most difficult materials to move in the yard.

On the jobsite the blower worked fine. We use it mostly in the applications we mentioned above.  One thing I did notice is that the blower provides a really decent amount of air, that actually reduced the need to move it back and forth, in a sweeping motion.

The handle and trigger area is open and large enough to allow comfortable gloved operation.

While I did not compare the cordless blower to my gas version I can tell you the I did not see any difference in the power between the too. So why would I want to deal with fuel mixtures, exhaust and that stupid pull cord?

Cost

The Milwaukee M18 Fuel Blower 2728-21HD costs approximately $279.00 for the blower, charger and 9.0 Ah battery.

Improvements?

There is not much to critique on the outside of this blower – what matters is what comes out of it!

The one area that I noticed that will need to be watched is the air tube connection to the blower housing. Milwaukee provides a lever button to disengage the air tube. This connection seems weak and I can see it wearing over time. I don’t plan on removing this tube at all – but it is one area to keep an eye on.

Overall Impression

Cordless blower manufacturers all make tradeoffs when designing their blowers. They need to decide how much power and runtime they want, utilizing their motors and electronics in order to achieve desired performance.

Finding the right amount of fan power and run-time is certainly a trade-off and  Milwaukee seems to have found a sweet spot at 15-feet and 20-minutes.

The Milwaukee M18 Fuel blower is a more than powerful, in the yard and job site, than the blowers I’ve used so far.

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