A power tool is a tool that’s actuated by an additional power source and mechanism apart from the solely manual labor used with hand tools. The most common types of power equipment use electric motors. Internal combustion engines and compressed surroundings are also typically used. Other power sources include steam engines, direct burning up of fuels and propellants, such as in powder-actuated tools, or even organic power resources such as wind or moving water. Tools directly driven by animal power aren’t generally considered power equipment.

Power tools are used in industry, in building, in the garden, for housework jobs such as cooking, cleaning, and around the house for purposes of generating (fasteners), drilling, trimming, shaping, sanding, grinding, routing, polishing, painting, heating and more.

Power tools are classified because either stationary or portable, where portable means hand-held. Portable power equipment have obvious advantages in mobility. Stationary power equipment, however, frequently have advantages in speed and accuracy. An average table saw, for instance, not merely cuts faster when compared to a regular hands saw, however the cuts are smoother, straighter, and more square than what’s normally achievable with a electric power tools hand-held power saw. Some stationary power equipment can produce objects that cannot be manufactured in any other method. Lathes, for example, produce truly round objects.

Stationary power tools for metalworking are usually called machine tools. The word machine tool isn’t usually put on stationary power equipment for woodworking, although such use is sometimes heard, and in some cases, such as drill presses and bench grinders, exactly the same device is used for both woodworking and metalworking.