*
Discussion Forum
Discussion Forum
Up Next
Video Shorts
Featured Story
Listeners write in about haunted pipes and building-science tomes, and they ask questions about roof venting and roof leaks.
Featured Video
Highlights
"I have learned so much thanks to the searchable articles on the FHB website. I can confidently say that I expect to be a life-long subscriber." - M.K.
Replies
*
Was cleaning up on a job I hired out since crew was gone. Found a 2x10 scissored onto another with 60 plus nails. Found one board had twelve nails on the last inch. Cracked the thing. Lead carpenter okay and so is most of crew. But one guy nails everything excessively. Got any stories to share?
*Sounds more like someone getting out some frustrations, than just a 'technique problem'.
*Yes, I've seen this kind of thing too. Someone is told to put up that panel or nail that CDX securely to that frame and what do you find later? A nail gun nail each inch along the 4 x 8 sheet. Its a waste of time, nails and effort, its not that funny. Now if the same guy had nailed the backside of his drawers to the top of a truss, that would be funny.
*b WBA At Your ServiceI had an apprentice with me about 7 years ago who had a similar affliction. When he was nailing, everything on the job got Dwaynerized. He used to call it Dwaynerization. Can you guess his name ? He's probably out there somewhere watching. If you are buddy, thanks again for helping me wear out more catspaws in two years than in my fifteen year career. One side job where he helped me, he nailed the last 9' rafter to the sheathed wall with 27 nails. Twenty seven ! And it was wrong ! He told me as he yanked the nails that he wanted to be sure it didn't go anywhere...
*We have a new hire on my crew that cannot find a stud when nailing baseboard. He proceeds to nail every inch until he finds one, Or, in the last case, a water pipe with 300$ worth of hardwood to go along. Needless to say, if a water pipe is in the middle of a stud wall a 2" nail would not hit it. Let me see 5/8 + 1/2 + 13/4- water pipe =over 2" at the least. Anyway, I dont condone the waste of nails and it makes things look ugly before finishing. Which is when many people see your work....even framers
*One local truss company requires us to nails some girders like this: 3 rows @ 2"o.c. on the bottom chord! Additionally, it needs bolts, although I don't know how you could find any open wood to put the bolts!I think the bolts are needed because the weight of the nails is pulling the girder down!blue
*Oh, about a dozen years ago this "finish" carpenter bought his first nailgun. I have to figure he was using about ten thousand nails to trim a little shack. An example was the entry door kicker from the garage, something like 24 nails, at least half of which were not set. I walk in while he was nailing off the base and he was running around the house shooting the thing off like someone was shooting back.The conversation started off something like "how would you like that gun stuck up your ass?"
*Had a framer that I nicknamed two-nail...He used very few nails...three jack to stud...one to two header through stud...I was wiring behind his work and pushed apart his wall with my drill twice!...Then I started checking the work...He was so proud of his speed...Speed meant not wasting time shooting nails it seems as I then spent half a day adding nails to all that two-nail had framed so speedily...I am real wary now of anyone who says they framed a hundred homes in Florida...I'd rather have a guy that never owned a hammer.near the stream,aj
*Had a cheap-a$$ boss once who used to hand out clips on a daily basis. He would calculate the number of nails/staples required per job and that was it. I used to keep my own supply just to make sure I could do the job right.On this same crew a co-worker was climbing into a raised furnace closet to install the interior trim when he sank a 1-1/4 staple into his thigh. I was the first one there and tried to pull him out, but he couldn't straighten out his leg because of the way the staple was in there. Had to yank it out with pliers which took 5 minutes because it was puckered in so far and I couldn't see. We gave him a hard time about wasting valuable staples.
*maybe he had a quota or had worked with someone who did. A friend of mine worked in a mobile home factory. They were given x amount of nails per house and you had to use them up yet still be fast. He would shoot about 50 nails into the last stud to make sure he used up his allotment (or so he says)
*When I was around 13 I got my first job driving nails. My boss instructed me to nail up some sheetrock in a bathroom. I cut and fit the 5'x4' piece and nailed it up and nailed it and nailed it and nailed it. My boss must have been curious at all the driving nails. He stuck his head in the room and said "Boy, looks someone shot that sheet with a shotgun" and went on back to work. That's all he had to say. I counted the nails in the sheet (over 80) and went to look at some other boards that were already hung. I felt pretty small but learned how to nail sheetrock that day.
*Hey wood,A sure cure for this man is having him putty all those wholes maybe on his own time if you can get away with it.
*How about Simpsons' HD nailing requirement? Two parallel rows of 8d's one inch apart. Is this an attempt to split a stud using nails?
*saw a detail recently for a built up stud column:something like a 16" bearing column, with studs nailed 3" stagger, AND, studs glued to each other with construction adhesive, that had to be spread out for full coverage across the face of the studs. Couldn't believe it. How do you bid that contraption? Alternately, a psl would be o.k. too. No kidding, which would you rather do? Better, which would you rather finish? Its the damn engineers who are responsible for all this mess... Once a guy sees a 3" nailing pattern, he thinks it would be good to do it everywhere.
*Was working on a very high end home in NY and was precutting and placing many of the straight runs of baseboard in place so all I'd have to do then is cut all the copes to accept them later on. Sometimes I do it this way just to break up the continuous repositioning of my mitre saw. Any way my genuis of a boss sees what I'm doing and says great, he'll give me one of the framing helpers to nail them up as I position them around the house. This house is fairly large and I'm pretty far away from this kid when he starts. After about an hour I finish upstairs and decide to move back downstairs and have the kid move up. When I got to the first floor I glad to see that he had taken his time to try to find the studs as I showed him. Unfortunately at sixteen in intervals were abouta dozen or more holes he had mmachine gunned into the base with a 16ga. trim nailer.hear the framers guns going off like this all the time but pay little attention to it. The first two years I learned framing we hand nailed everything. When you learn like this it becomes clear real fast you want to use no more nails then you have to. It was the last time I ever aacceptedny help with trim installation. Better to be at a steady pace and precise than go through that again.
*I once had to do some punch behind a bunch of nailgun-happy goofballs who shot nothing but 2.5" nails. Guess why the pocket doors were stuck in their pockets.
*Speaking of nailing patterns. Does anyone remember the old Audel series of construction books? I use to have a few of them, and I believe there wwere section s dedicated to nailing paterns for beams(built-up),toe nailing studs,sheating etc. I think there was also an FHA spec. sheet that cover nailing just about everything in home construction. I know the books are at least 20 years out of print, maybe more, but I think some of the carpentry section s still could be used today. Are these issue covered in the new unified buiding codes?
*Dave, I have a set of the Audels books beside me on my desk here. I got them at a flea market for $25 a few years ago. They are in great shape and are fun to ead and stil have some very pertinent information.Kind of like how things aren't but should be.
*