Potentially have a couple of jobs coming up that will involve laying down some some hardwood floors. So, I want to buy a flooring gun as opposed to renting one ( think it will be cheaper costwise plus I get another tool………… o.k. I get another tool). Ive only used the air powered cleat nailers before, and plan on getting something pneaumatic ( heard to many horror stories about using the manual nailers). So what would you guys recommend, cleat nailer or stapler ( for example bostitch MIIIFN vs MIIIFS). What are the advanteges/ disadvantages of each?
Thanks for any help,
m2akita
Replies
Sorry
I don't have the answer for you but as long as you started this thread I thought I'd also ask why are pneumatic guns better than my Portanailer?
You still have to hit the gun with the hammer plus you have to deal with hoses.
I never understood the reasoning.....maybe because I never used an air gun for floors.
Be floored
andy
"My life is my practice"
Andy,
My experience is limited to putting down a few hundered square feet using a Bostitch Mark III which is a pneumatic floor stapler. It worked very well on the 1 1/2" red oak I was putting down.
Even though you do still hit the nailer with a hammer, the hammer blow is pulling the board tight while the staple is driven pneumatically. A brisk tap is all that is required, not a full hammer blow.
Sort of like automotive power brakes. Your foot still pushes the pedal down, but the vacuum assist does most of the work.
For the original poster - I asked the cleat/staple question myself before starting my job. In this area at least, all the floor guys use the Bostitch Mark III stapler.
John
andy... i've owned a Porta-nailer since '75..two in fact ( the first one is actually a Rockwell, newer one is teh successor... Porta-Nailer)
.. finally bought a Bostich flooring stapler last year...
hard to know where it is these days.. all my friends ( that own their own hand -powered floor nailers) come and borrow it... i don't buy staples any more.. they give me boxes of them.. and i can buy SS staples too... like for Fir porch decks..
you will not believe how much faster, easier, and BETTER your floors go with a flooring stapler....
wanna buy a couple Porta-nailers cheap ? all rebuilt.. in their steel cases Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Mike
Yeh
I have two Porta nailers as well and what I hate most is how often they jam.
Do the air ones jam as much?
Thanks
a"My life is my practice"
"I'd also ask why are pneumatic guns better than my Portanailer?
You still have to hit the gun with the hammer plus you have to deal with hoses."
Andy,
Never used one of those specifically nor ever seen one. (only flooring I've put down was 5/16" plank with a small Bostitch specific to that application)..
But, if you think of the physics behind it all, more energy imparted by the hammer to get the planks tight vs. driving the nail.
Jon
see ya next week jon.be ready to roof.........kidding....actually, you'll be my excuse to stop other than rain.
aMy life is my passion!
http://CLIFFORDRENOVATIONS.COM
Found a used Bostitch MIIIFS (thats the pneumatic stapler) that Im gonna buy off a guy that doesnt want it any more ( got lucky on the timing). Hopefully itll all work out.
ANDY- Ive never used the manual nailers, but Ive heard the horror ( or aching shoulder stories) from number of people who have. Next chance you get, you should try one out. Better try out two so you can have one for your helper ( since your gonna buy him his own Max framer to use). :)
-m2akita
used both but i'm no flooring guy
pneumatic is easier despite the hose, with the pneumatic nailer, the hammer just tightens the joint and air powers the nail and with a good gun, more reliable as far as misfires are concerned
caulking is not a piece of trim
Go with the MIIIFS ,Bostitch stapler. IMO the stapler will hold better (two legs compared to one clete) and also a little thiner , less chance of splitting wood. Good luck
i have the same one as ben... no , it doesn't jam... it is one sweet machine and the floors come out BETTER than they did with the Porta-nailerMike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Mike,
Thanks, I'll remember that the next time I do strip flooring.
I think I spent more time unjamming that fricken Porta nailer than installing the actual floors.
Presently this house will be covered in wide eastern white pine planks and face nailed.....so all I need right now is my Douglas.
On the subjects of nail guns (not to steal this thread).
I'm not sure if I mentioned to you that I ended up buying the Max nail gun for my perfection roof and sidewalls.
After trying it out for a few hours I ordered a second one. Completely awesome and so light weight.....not to mention real purdy.
Be rained out...ugh
andy"My life is my practice"
after telling you about the N64 at Quaker Lane for $300... i went back over and bought it... so now we have an N63C, and (2) N64C...
tomorrow is Bostich Day at my lumber yard... the factory reps tune up all the bostich guns you bring in... also special deals..
i'll pick up another N88RH with the metal connector nose (sweet ).. and maybe one of the new combo brad/staplersMike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Speaking as an amateur weekend warrior,
I used a Bostitch stapler and laid 800 sf of oak floor
without any jams at all.
E
Bought one Max loved it so much I bought another....so light its unreal...purdy too"My life is my practice"
bostitch pneumatic cleat nailer.... installed thousands sq ft wood flooring i am the destroyer of forests air power is the only way to go even w compressor and air lines involved you concentrate on the floor install rather than beating yourself up w manual machine, better job when fatigue factors out
demo only an individual board, staples are harder to remove than nails across the field of the floor, neither is going to let go, be weak or noisier more than the other
owned staplers since 1983, they sometimes break/often fracture the tongues. this can make succeeding courses harder to set, rarely have to dress them w chisel you can adjust air lower for material being used which does help, but not when grain pattern inclined to break doesn't occur w nails because of single point fastening
staple will occasionally bend/break in jaw of gun, keep set allen wrenches around to loosen base and magazine to free up... doesn't occur w nailgun both have to be rebuilt occasionally, parts for one teardown comes w new gun along w diagrams, not hard to rebuild either machine
air guns are reliable, few drops oil at start and again mid-day. try cat oil, a synthetic, guns run smoother the jams i did have w staples were bad generic fasteners, haven't heard of this problem for awhile repair guys told me same, and lack of oil, too high air pressure as other maintenance problems
big help is to use swivel couplings and the new poly air lines, can't recall name light and flexible, no weight to drag around if using oil type compressor, amsoil and red line oil both have synthetic compressor oils, runs quieter in work space, doesn't thicken in winter do compressor tank drain downs daily or even mid-day and keep water out of guns
good tip-someone mentioned ss staples for exterior fir flooring done this couple times, but seldom comes up as framers or deck guy usually does floor can always rent or borrow stapler for this application
for strong quiet floors, stagger end joints 8" course to course
after a day of pounding that powernailer, the hammer gets prettyheavy by about two oclock. I can run the same amt of flooring in a day as with the pneumatics but feel it more. Gotta get the cardiac workout occasionally somehow. The only jams I've ever had were from not striking hard enough.
Mike, I always rented or subbed but I might be interested in buying one of those power nailers when I come down this summer. Omly use it once or twice a year but it'll make a good door stop meantime.
Welcome to the
Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime.
where ...
Excellence is its own reward!
My wife christened the manual cleat nailer as the "whack-F*CK machine". What a bastard to use if you're not accurate and strong with the mallet! As an amateur laying ~ 800 sq ft of red oak prefinished, I was on a good run if I delivered 5 cleats before I didn't quite hit the nailer hard enough with the mallet and didn't completely deliver the cleat. Then it was out with the hammer and punch (if I was lucky) or the Dremel to saw the thing off (if I wasn't). What a nuisance!
Did an equal sq ftage of birch on the top floor with a rental Bostitch pneumatic stapler- half the effort and not a single jam.
I've got the Porta Nailer, bought it used from a rental place. It was a lot of work for my first floor job and I eventually realized it was ok to swing the mallet with two hands and I didn't have to impress myself. I didn't have a big problem with jams.
Then I used a rental pneumatic for the next job. An amazing difference, much easier. It almost makes nailing flooring down fun, especially compared to the old way.
Then I bought a very used Bostitch MIII floor stapler. I'd read that cleats were better than staples, so I bought a conversion kit for about $100 and switched it around myself. The cleats work well on standard oak, but still split some tongues on hard maple flooring. I learned not to nail too close to the edge of the board, and to squirt a little wood glue in the tongue on the splits.
My MIII is so old that it has a pull trigger in the base; DANGEROUS as there is no safety, but it lets me nail closer to the far wall when there isn't room to swing the hammer. The nailer leaks a little and the pounding tends to loosen up the bolts holding down the shoe, but it still works fine. Or at least that is what everybody who borrows it from me says (it just went out the door again on Monday). I've got a replacement bag of O rings for when it gets too bad.
Dusty and Lefty
Dusty and Lefty
LOL
So you used two hands?
Is the right one Dusty and the other one Lefty?
or is Lefty Dusty too?
;)
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
Hah! No, I'm Dusty and my left hand is, uh, Lefty. That can't be right. Now I'm even more confused. That means I'm Dusty, Lefty and Confused, especially this late at night. But the cabinets are installed, the daughter has finished her math homework, the 1980 Volvo's driver's door is back on the car (a long story to go in a different thread maybe), and I'm about to put a bucket of assorted tools and parts away and feed the cats.
DL&C
Good night, Dusty, tell Lefty that he is All Right, except for when he is wrong, then he is Knot, you are still confused, and I hope the three of you got all your taxes paid!
I was just thinking that an accountant's favorite bible verse must be "Let knot your right hand know what your left hand is doing"
It sure couln't have been a carpenter's verse or we couldn't use a hammer and nails
;)
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
Put me down for the Bostich air nailer, cleat. LOVE IT! One jam in probably 3,000sq ft of flooring. (Bamboo). I can install all day, and both arms are still the same length,as oppossed to when I've used manual porta-nailer. When ever I wonder what my favorite tool is, I realize that it's the one I'm using at the time, so at this point, it is definatly my flooring nailer! Beck
I see why one could get frustrated over it. Sounds like you wife should have nick named it the Whack-diddle machine instaed of the "whack-F*CK machine" since you were only diddling with it.
;)
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
I have the porta-nails pneumatic nailer it has a face nailer shoe attachment, two minutes to change over. Much less effort to use than my regular porta- nailer. I bought the new pneumatic so the nails were the same for both nailers.