I've use a cheap £50 Ryobi sds drill. I burn out one every 2 years or so. I do about 2 100mm cores per year and charge an extra £150 on top of bill if a core is required.

I give customers the option of doing the core themselves ( not using my drill) and agree to knock off £150 from the bill if they do.
2or 3 customers take me up on this each year. One changed his mind and got me to do it when he struggled.
If drill burns out fine, £50 to get a new one.
 
I've use a cheap £50 Ryobi sds drill. I burn out one every 2 years or so. I do about 2 100mm cores per year and charge an extra £150 on top of bill if a core is required.

I give customers the option of doing the core themselves ( not using my drill) and agree to knock off £150 from the bill if they do.
2or 3 customers take me up on this each year. One changed his mind and got me to do it when he struggled.
If drill burns out fine, £50 to get a new one.

I've definitely been undercharging for coring out holes by the looks of it! Usually just charge about £30! My core drill is pretty good though - most 107mm holes in cavity walls take about 2 minutes unless it's engineering brick (Marcrist DDM1 - £240 from Screwfix, possibly cheaper if you shop around HHD, well worth it IMO).
 
£30. That's well cheap. You've got to take into consideration the wear and tear on the drill. Or in my case the replacement.

Also if you have bought some a super £250-£300 core drill it needs to be paid for by the customer.
 
My 240 dewalt sds has cut loads of core holes 32mm to 125mm and I use it for chasing out,still going after 3 years......beat to death but still going best £100 odd quid ever spent!

ummmmmm....sorry happy hippy buried in my van and I’m buried in the sofa! It is basically their cheap range sds that I bought when first starting out, I do lots of bathrooms and kitchens and partial/full rewires on occasion so it’s had a lot of use! been waiting for it to die for ages so I can justify a new one!
2kgs happy hippy has a clutch as well,used it again today for a 50mm hole........still going! Got an extractor in the morning as well!
 
Thanks for all the advice guys.

I have just bought a Makita 8406 for £200 and reckon I'll be pretty happy with it :)
 
I realise this has been asked before, but I find the search bar really poor on the site since the big change and it doesn't come up with anything useful.

I am getting more extractor fan installs that require wall mounted fans. Instead of hiring a core drill once a year I wondered if anyone uses their corded SDS drill?

I used a friends 4kg SDS and it seemed fine. My SDS is a Bosch GBH 2.7kg and I wondered if this was sufficient for perhaps 4 or 5 x 100mm holes p/year?

Cheers.
You can use a core drill with a sds drill just turn off the hammer action.
 
I use a cheap Parkside sds from Lidl that cost £40 with a 3 year warranty & has a clutch. I don't do that many core holes, I've used it for about ten 4" & 5" holes in the last 4 years but it's still going, I think it's more than paid for itself.
 
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I use a cheap Parkside sds from Lidl that cost £40 with a 3 year warranty & has a clutch. I don't do that many core holes, I've used it for about ten 4" & 5" holes in the last 4 years but it's still going, I think it's more than paid for itself.
I had a parkside also, it lasted about 18 months before I burnt it out. £40 no problem.
 
My SDS is a Bosch GBH 2.7kg and I wondered if this was sufficient for perhaps 4 or 5 x 100mm holes p/year?

Depends what you are coring into!

I wouldn't be using a battery SDS to core holes for fans! Surely no one would. Would they?!

Yes, and have done in softer materials.
 
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Core drill for, charged by the hour
 

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SDS drill being used instead of core drill?
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