Replies

1. 
   Guest_ | Aug 12, 2000 12:49am | #1

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   Gardner

   Check with you local building inspector's office. Some cities do not accept the clipped heads. Do a search in the archives. This topic has been covered quite a few times in the past. Recommend that you stick with the nails recommended by the manufactuere of the gun you have or plan to purchase. FHB magazine did an article on this subject within the past year.

   Vince

1. 
   Guest_ | Aug 12, 2000 04:49pm | #2

   *Perhaps clipped heads were a nailer design compromise on early nailers that was then allowed in Some areas. Now full head nailers are available and work just fine. Nail costs are about the same.So, unless you have a Bunch of old clipped to use up buy a full head nailer.

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   Guest_ | Aug 12, 2000 05:36pm | #3

   *I'd say that a major advantage of clipped nails is that there are twice as many of them in a strip. I run a Pasload Powermaster and really like it and the powermaster plus. Have been using a co-workers Duo fast, full head gun this week and CAN'T STAND IT! Always out of nails, always! It also has a "sequential trigger" that wont fire unless the safety is first fully depressed and then the trigger pulled. VERY VERY FRUSTRATING! Might keep the casual user from hurting themselves but has no place in production work. On a similar note, I saw in a JLC add the other day that Senco is introducing a frame gun with a "smart chip". It's an embedded micro-processor that is supposed to keep a user from hurting themselves with a miss-fire. Any carpenter that is so foolish that they need their nail gun to be smarter than they are, is a danger to us all and should be alowed to mortally wound themselves post haste. I believe this is Darwinian (sp?) evolution at work and in the workplace! It is a dangerous job we have and we need to allow for that buy being more carefull, not buy asking our tools to think for us!!!!!!!!!!!!! I love Senco products and I think they produce the best guns available, but this smart chip is a HUGE leap in the wrong dirrection.Gardner, If your local BC permits cliped head nails(which most places do) I'd go with either the Pasload powermaster plus or the Senco (I for get the #) minus the smart chip. If you have to have the full head, Senco makes a great one.P.S. Another important feature is a nose that will open easy to clear a jambed nail. BIG ADVANTAGE that many guns, like the duo-fast, don't have.Good luck and don't shoot yourself, Phat Bastard

1. 
   Guest_ | Aug 12, 2000 11:51pm | #4

   *Phat, please. If they can make it safer, of course they should. Your logic is like saying if you need a guard on your skill saw you're an idiot. I have a friend who lost a thumb with this kind of thinking. It seems every year I read a story about someone who got shot in the head by a person going down a ladder, or by climbing up into a gun held by someone above. The longer I'm in this buisness, the more I look back and see stupid things I've done. As I get older and I hope wiser, I work alot safer, and make sure those around me do too.

1. 
   Guest_ | Aug 13, 2000 04:33am | #5

   *There is no advantage what so ever for clipped head verses full round head. One holds just as good as the other.Paslode is my brand of choice. Personally I dislike Duo-Fast (only gun company that fixes you guns for free.........because they break so often), also, they won't sell their nails anywhere but a DouFast dealer. What a pain. Senco is a great gun, the clipped head model. But the gun and the nails are high dollar. Paslode guns will shoot Paslode nails or Senco. And you can buy the nails at HD.My opinion,Ed. Williams

2. 
   Scott_MacLEOD | Aug 13, 2000 02:52pm | #6

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   Ed:
   Just showing my ignorance here. But I don't understand how a clipped head nail will hold as well as a full head. It seems to me that the full head has more surface area and therefore would hold better. But I don't claim to know. Please explain. Thanks. Scott

3. 
   Guest_ | Aug 13, 2000 06:26pm | #7

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   Scott,

   The extra steel (very little of it) is a moot point in my book.

   Try this, nail two sets of 2x4's together. One with cliped head nails and one with full round heads. Nail them together good. Just for the heck of it, nail two more together with hand drivers. Now go get your pry bar.

   You'll see what I mean.

   Good luck getting any of them apart without a struggle.

   Ed. Williams

1. 
   Guest_ | Aug 13, 2000 09:05pm | #8

   *Steve,Got to tell ya' buddy.Safe, experienced, workers with even a bit of sense don't point nailguns at their co-workers much less hold them pointing down, over some ones head. I've been around a while now and must say that I've never heard of anyone being nailed in the head, except maybe on purpose. When I was but a wee-shaver, I once shot myself with a 16 square in the end of my left thumb. ONCE. Thumb is long since as good as new and strangely enough, I now know enough not to bounce fire when I build a wall on the ground and also know that if I must hold the stud up to the plate, to keep my dam hand a bit further back.I see one of the major problems in this country as the total abdication of personal responsibility by most folks. All I'm saying is that while I DO NOT like to see people wedge the guards up on their saws, I also do not see the need to be protected from my self to such a degree that I can't do my job effectively. Tool makers with already superior tools and established markets for them, should not add expensive gizmos that ultimately make the tool LESS RELIABLE and as a consequence, make the worker less productive.I'll say it again. This is a rough buisness we're in. Some days, despite your best efforts to the contrary, you get banged up a bit. But the perks are good too. You get to eat soup out of the can, fart all you want, listen to music your wife hates, and then there is all the free wood!Help the newbees work safer and better but leave the full body condom in the garage.Be Well, Phat Bastard

4. 
   Gardner_Goetze | Aug 14, 2000 05:14am | #9

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   What are the pros and cons if any to using clipped head nailers versus full round head pneumatic nailers. Which style nail/nailer is better for general framing?