Tool Review: DeWalt DCW210 Sander

DeWalt DCW210 5″ Sander

Tool: DCW210 5″ Sander
Manufacturer: DeWalt
Price: $199 with battery, $119 for bare tool

The DCW210 5-inch random orbit sander is one of the latest woodworking tools in DeWalt’s 20-volt MAX cordless line. I’m sure I don’t have to try very hard to interest woodworkers in the freedom afforded by a battery-powered sander. Not just the freedom from a power cord, but also the freedom to grab your work and take it outside to keep accumulated sawdust and cloudy air out of the workshop altogether.

This sander features a powerful brushless motor, dust-sealed switch, 8,000-12,000 rpm speed dial, and a cloth dust collection bag that snaps onto its positive-locking dust port tube. The switch and dial operate effortlessly with the sander held in one hand, but the dust port is not so easy to use. I tried to fit the port to 10 other dust collection vac hoses in my collection with no luck—the sander is only designed to clip onto a specific DeWalt hose end.

Fitted with a compact 2.0 amp-hour (AH) battery pack (combined weight 2.9 lbs.), the sander ran for 16 1/2 minutes. The tool also feels light and lively enough (3.5 lbs.) with a 4.0 AH pack, but DeWalt’s larger 6.0 and 9.0 AH Flexvolt packs are heavy enough to tip the sander over and are too clumsy to consider.

While using the sander for surfacing glue-lam workbench slabs with #60-grit disks, I could really lean on it with both hands without stalling or overheating the tool. And in tests on hard maple with #100 grit discs, the DCW210 removed 4.9 grams of sawdust in three minutes. And its dust bag collected 61 percent of the dust created—both metrics on par with other cordless sanders I’ve tested.

— Michael Springer

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