DEWALT Angle Grinder, 4.5 Inch, 11 Amp (DWE402)

A good solid small grinder. A bit bigger than the last one which held up real well on the job.
Looking forward to lots of good service from this one as well.

I’ve tried ever grinder on the market and will never buy anything else for this size. It is the most comfortable giving me great control, holds up great and Dewalt stands behind there products. I’ve burnt out a few motors but their service center has fixed or replaced them with question.

I bought this cause my grinder is a battery milwaukee that lasts about 10 mins of low pressure grinding and my old corded one got jacked out of my garage.

I knew full well what the project was when I ordered it. I got a piece of a scrapped machine at work and wanted to use it for ballast in my 4×4 in winter without giving up cargo space with sand bags.

I am a truck mechanic and have been for many years. I have put many quality grinders in their final resting place. Most of them you could tell on day one what to expect.

This one will be with me at home for the rest of my years. I fed this thing a hot supper for 8 hrs strait upon receipt. amazon got it here 2 days before promised which was exactly when I needed it. I was finishing blowing snow when the mail man brought it and went right to work. I used up 8 cut wheels 3 gemini cut-n-grind (which are awesome) and 6 flap disks.

First the bad. The guard is way too big. I am sure it is for consumables that have the built in nut because they are much taller. I cut and sanded it to be correct for the type I use. Then the spindle is too long. with a wheel on it sticks out 5/16 past the nut. so I took er to the belt grinder and with the motor running sanded it flush to the nut…took the nut off and feathered a little chamfer on it. Something inside was chattering when I started. I took the cover/spindle off of the gearbox and smeared the high quality moly grease over the ring gear, which was dry. the sound continued for about 20 mins then went away and it ran as smooth as any I have ever used. I think it may have been the brushes on the commutator getting acquainted.

The good. More power than you need. The consumables can only handle so much. It is light weight/power balanced and smooth, after a break in period. Running a grinder is never “fun” so having one that can make the least work of it is important.

5 stars is not enough. There is sooo much junk out there now. this is not that. pro grade tool ready to work. 1 star assembled in USA. this is important to me as we make great stuff, I hope they expand on it. I bled red for many years but the future may hold primarily yellow for this reason alone. 1 star for power. 1 for staying cool. 1 for feels good in the hand. 1 star for fast and easy disk change. 1 star forthe cord, very flexible and did not get hot. 1 star for packaging, not excessive and went in my wood burner not the dump. 1 star cause yellow tools are hard to lose in a mess.

lost a star as it did not come with the spanner for the nut, surely a packaging mishap. it did come with a 3/8 allen wrench that I have no idea why. still way over 5. I did have to remove a few wheels with the edge of a table yesterday. You just hold the lock, which is perfect on this tool, tap the wheel on the edge of the bench in the correct direction and it comes right off….you often break the wheel doing this but it is usually not one worth saving if you do.

I have a smaller 4in Makita angle grinder that I’ve used for years. And while it’s mostly gotten the job done, it’s become increasingly more difficult to find all of the 4in wheels and brushes that are available for the slightly larger 4-1/2 in grinders. Finally I decided to buy the Dewalt Angle Grinder Tool, 4-1/2-Inch, 11-Amp (DWE402K). This thing is a beast! Because this thing is such a powerful little machine (11 amps at 11,000 rpm), I strongly urge anyone buying this angle grinder to read all of the instructions, including ALL of the stuff about safety. Seriously – this is not a toy. This is a high-powered machine designed to do some really tough work. When turned on, it will almost jump out of your hands if you’re not expecting the torque this thing has. I’ve come to buy numerous different wheels and brushes and this has been a pure joy to use. It is such a well-designed machine. The DWE402K comes with the basic DWE402 grinder, but includes a hard plastic case which I really like. While my new Dewalt grinder hasn’t been in its case since I bought it, I like having cases for all my shop tools. When finished with a project and I’m cleaning up my shop, I like to clean up all of my tools and put them away in their respective cases together with any special tools or attachments. The dewalt comes with an allen wrench which I’ve never needed (stays in the case). And (sadly) there’s not much spare room in the case for extra wheels or brushes. As for the grinder itself – I really like it for its design and ability to do real work. On some grinders, the guard is more of a pain because it’s always in the way and can’t be easily adjusted. So it’s taken off and never put back on. That’s shameful. Always use your guard, it’s there to protect you. The guard on the Dewalt is genius. This guard is designed the way all guards should be. It can be easily rotated 360 degrees to any direction (read the instructions so you understand exactly how this works – and never try to adjust the guard without unplugging the grinder first) and the guard can be completely removed if ever needed. The 5/8in spindle is perfectly designed for quick changing wheels and brushes. The spin-on and off feature makes this a truly tool-less grinder. No special tools are needed to remove and replace wheels and brushes. Just twist them off an on with your hand. Again – unplug the grinder first – right?! The grinder also comes with a pair of 5/8in-to-7/8in “arbor” or a flat-washer-looking-thing for compressing wheels that don’t spin-on to the spindle using threads, but rather have a larger clearance-hole, non-threaded diameter hole for mounting. It’s a great system that requires no tools. The on-off control for the grinder is a simple paddle wheel with a built-in safety switch … it’s a breeze to use. Very comfortable. There’s also an over-ride lock so you don’t have to continuously hold down the paddle switch when working on large areas at a time. The power cord is tough but it’s only 6ft long which in my mind seems a little short. My personal preference would be an 8ft or 10ft power cord. The only other improvement would be some sort of easy sky-hook to hang the grinder on the side of a bench or table. Bottom line, this Dewalt DWE402K Angle Grinder is the bomb! If you have serious work that needs to be done – this is the defacto standard in angle grinders. Seriously, this is one powerful and potentially dangerous beast of a tool in the wrong hands. For me – this is exactly what I was looking for! Be careful out there!

Bought this to replace the Milwaukee angle grinder that went bad. This seems to be a bit larger handle to hold. I have to use the wrench to loosen the nut a lot more to remove the discs. The Dewalt wrench is an allen wrench, but there are two other holes in the nut that one can use the standard 2-prong tool like the Milwaukee. The only thing I don’t care for is the lock-on button. Unlike the Milwaukee grinder this process can be completed one handed, the Dewalt requires on hand to start, then the other hand to press the lock button.

I have had this grinder for over a year. I use it in my shop but I am not a heavy user. With that said I have used it on many projects and I am very satisfied with the unit. No problems and I would buy it again.