Any cordless drill will work. The extra torque and battery longevity gets better with the high end cordless brush-less drills but even a old 12V drill will cut ice but probably not all day. The clam plate in one version will allow using a cordless drill without having to remove the chuck. Unfortunately they are all sold out nationally for the season. There are often adapters sold that can adapt a drill or drill clam plate to any existing make of hand auger so buying a new auger often isn't necessary. In my case though I elected to have a custom machined adapter made that threads directly onto the drive spindle after the chuck was removed and bought a new fin bor hand auger to complete the package. I have no plans to ever use that new drill for anything other than an ice auger.
As an edit I fished for flat fish today and was on about 16" of ice. I cut somewhere between 50 and 100 holes and still had 2/3 original power as indicated on the battery LED's. My set up is a beast.
Today I cut 75 holes and then loaned to a buddy who filled his gas auger with gas and forgot to put the cap on the tank resulting in a mess in the back of his truck and an empty gas auger. The thing still had 2/3 power when I stuck the battery in the charger.
Cost of the new set up:
Dewalt DCD995m2 drill kit- $249.00
Custom 16" machined adapter- $ 54.00
New Fin Bor 6" hand auger- $95.00
So for roughly $400 bucks I have a replacement for my aging high end Nils Master/ Tanaka gas power auger that cost new $600 to $650
Last edited by Champlain Islander; 02-28-2017 at 02:11 AM.