Any drill nowadays would have a clutch. Use it, so it limits the torque. It applies for pretty much any kind of work (e.g. including mounting intake manifold on a lawn-mower, but then it's likely to use a torque wrench too)

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mschuster91 2 hours ago | parent [-]

> Any drill nowadays would have a clutch. Use it, so it limits the torque.

The problem is, unless it's an actual torque wrench these clutches are allll over the place. There's a reason they give only some arbitrary scale, and often enough they're so unreliable that the same electric screwdriver / drill will produce different torques for the same setting depending on the battery SoC, the power setting and the cleanliness of the thread in the wood.

I've found the most reliable way for IKEA furniture is to use an electric screwdriver for the bulk of the work and use a manual screwdriver for the final 1-2 turns. Everything else is just asking for trouble, especially the screw "overshooting" because the particle density at one hole is randomly (markedly) less than at the hole you calibrated the screwdriver with.

	▲	xxs 16 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		While not-precise settings 1-3 usually don't do much and after 4-5 screws you'd know which setting feels right (incl. tightening by hand to climb the scale). Most folks won't have sub 5Nm torque wrenches in general to calibrate or finish, so it'd be wrist tight feeling, I suppose. >depending on the battery SoC, The clutch is mechanical, so it should not matter and for brushless motors, the battery charge (voltage) should not matter at low torque, either. Just to be clear - I'd not advise to copy someone else's drill clutch settings. Worst case if you end up stripping the chipboard - fill with putty of epoxy and wood shavings, wait for 5-6mins, re-drill, so on. It's annoying if it happens but overall it's quite easy to recover from.