Replies

1. 
   BenA | Mar 22, 2006 03:47pm | #1

   I like the Bostitch BT200K-2 18 gauge brad nailer. Its a 1/2 lb. lighter that the senco, 170 IN /LB of driving power and also it is oil free. Now Bostitch has a seven year warranty with their tools, not a bad deal IMO. Good luck with your purchase.. see link below.

   http://www.bostitch.com/default.asp?CATEGORY=BOS%5FFINISH%5FAND%5FTRIM%5FNAILER&TYPE=PRODUCT&PARTNUMBER=BT200K-2&SDesc=Industrial+2%22%2C+18%2DGauge+Oil%2DFree+Brad+Nailer+Kit

1. 
   Greg80 | Mar 23, 2006 07:34am | #2

   Senco and Hitachi make the best guns.  Everything else stinks.  Senco also keeps parts in stock forever.  Bostich are popular as they are usually stronger for a given weight, but they tend to be difficult to have repaired.  If you get an oil-less gun, make for positive sure you use filtered air in it, and mark the side with a big magic marker "Do Not Oil!"  if you do, you will ruin it instantly.

1. 
   RickL | Mar 24, 2006 04:01pm | #6

   Used to work on nails gun and there's a lot of good ones out  there. Oil in an oilless gun won't destroy it. Hitachi is a good brand but so is Senco, Palode, Bostich, Duofast, Max, Kihlberg, etc. we had great luck with the imports such as Airy, Supco, etc.

1. 
   Greg80 | Mar 24, 2006 11:58pm | #7

   If you worked on airguns you would know that oil in an oil-less gun will mess it up, at least to the point where it won't work until you get it serviced--and if you try to use it anyway, the barrel will get scored.

   And whatever you want to say about the quality of other guns is immaterial if a person can't get parts for them.  Senco and Hitachi are readily and easily available, the others are not.  And quite frankly, the LESS a person uses a gun the more important it is to buy one that's servicable.  Factories buy those junk imports, use them up in six months, then throw them in the garbage because they've had it by then under those conditions.

1. 
   csacoe | Mar 25, 2006 12:17am | #9

   The key word was " LUCK "

2. 
   RickL | Mar 25, 2006 01:21am | #10

   Actually a little oil in them won't hurt them.
   I don't know your background but the factories would buy the better name guns. It's the small shops and hobby woodworkers that would buy the imports. We sold a ton of Airy and Supco guns and we stocked all the parts for them as well as Hitachi, Senco, Paslode, Haubold, etc. We used to give loaners so guys could keep the job going as well. The imports aren't that bad. I had a guy who fixed Bostich and Duofast Noertheast carries and repairs pretty much all the guns available.

3. 
   Greg80 | Mar 25, 2006 03:39pm | #11

   My background is aerospace assembly for ten years, head buyer for a major tool distributor and warranty repair center for for ten years, a contractor in a family of contractors all my life.  Let me teach you something.  There's two ways to look at who buys what tools.  Cheap units that are disposable are bought by  weedend types who don't want to spend the money and factories, like I said, where the tools get beat up before they wear out.  I don't care what you buy, if it's getting thrown around by monkeys that don't care it's not going to last. Repairs are not even considered.

   Artists. contractors, craftsmen, people that actually take care of their stuff (sometimes) -- The people that you and I fixed tools for -- are usually the ones that buy good stuff.  It's just my perspective, but I don't consider five *craftsmen* in a shop making quality furniture a "factory".

   I have three air nailers, senco's, but I only use them occasionally these days.  I restore antiques now instead of being a trim guy so the need is just not there.  I know, from experience, that as long as senco is around, there will be parts readily available just a phone call away.  I don't have to pack the unit in a box and send it to some unknown repair center that claims to fix some weird brand of tool and take my chances.

   You may have worked for a good and reputable repair place, so I don't know, but you and I BOTH know that for every decent repair place there are twenty that are jokes where some old guy with three worn out screwdrivers and a pair of vicegrips is just keeping his head above water and every part he gets has gone through twenty hands and has been marked up 5000%.  I don't know, maybe I'm just being anal, but I like the idea of there being ten service and parts centers per state -- instead of three in the entire country for some over engineered eurotrash tool that sell $8.00 o-rings and $25 brushes.  I wouldn't give you two cents for an Airy, never even hear of supco, and seen more people throw a pasload against a wall in frustration than I care to speak of.

   Just my opinion.

   Edited 3/25/2006 8:43 am ET by Greg80

4. 
   csacoe | Mar 26, 2006 04:20pm | #12

   HERE ! HERE !

5. 
   Greg80 | Mar 29, 2006 12:58am | #16

   I tend to get carried away -- I see what's happening here.  I'm sorry.  Half the people are talking about professional tools and the other half are twenty years old talking about the tool they found in Costco next to the chinese lightbulbs.

6. 
   csacoe | Mar 31, 2006 02:55am | #17

   Well, I  seem to notice that people endorse what they've gotten used to. I personaly look for quality in performance then service. And if the product IS quality then service shouldn't be much of an issue. I don't mind paying up front for performance and reliabilty, ie. Festool etc..  Some people, even though they have the money won't come off the hip and purchase bargin bin tools thinking they've beaten the system. But the joke is on them due to down time and aggrivation of jumping through hoops to get the junk fixed. " I don't get paid to play. ", so I buy the best.

7. 
   sapwood | Mar 31, 2006 05:47am | #18

   I just purchased another Senco pinner because my old one (16 years old) won't shoot the short pins. I needed to do some 5/8" pins. There's a lot of difference between the two: the old one is all metal and the new has quite a bit of plastic. They load differently and the new one is oil free. I wonder how it will hold up. Anyway, I looked at the Bostitch and another one..... maybe Paslode. I still liked the way the nose is built on the Senco. Seems to offer fewer things to keep it from getting into tight places. It shoots great.

8. 
   alanplanesaw | Mar 28, 2006 05:47am | #13

   So what is the best 23 guage nailer?

   thanks,

   Alan - planesaw

9. 
   nicobie | Mar 28, 2006 08:13pm | #14

   I've used an Airy brad nailer daily for 8 years, and just now is it starting to jam, maybe once a week.

    

   Just a fact...not an opinion. 

10. 
    Greg80 | Mar 29, 2006 12:19am | #15

    Good for you.   At the rate I'm using my brad nailer now -- every day -- it'll be ten years before I even run a box nails through it.  And i've seen dozens of people over the years bring in tools from the 1950's for repair because that's how long it took them to put thirty hours on the tool.

    If you're using it often, parts wear out -- FACT -- and have to be replaced.  If you're not replacing parts, you're not using it often.  Like Tires on the car.  They wear out. Trust me -- airy hasn't developed some kind of steel or rubber that no one else in the world knows about that doesn't wear.  You may think you're using it a lot, but you're not.  And if you're NOT using it a lot, the concern is how long the company stocks parts.

    But I'll tell you this, from my personal experience, having had *thousands* different guns from ten different companies pass through my hands for repair:  Senco's are the ONLY guns I've seen still in use after ten, sometimes twenty years of eight hour days, boxes of nails that went through them in the thousands, their owners buying o-ring kits ten at a time, the casings so hand worn that your couldn't even read the logo any more.  No one else's.  Not even close.

11. 
    SantaBarbaraSawDust | Apr 03, 2006 02:20am | #19

    Dang, I guess my oil-less nailer that I just now realized after a year and a half is oil-less, forgot to "get messed up." Funny thing about that tool, like me, I can only guess it didn't read the instruction manual and realize it shouldn't be working any more.

2. 
   Pondfish | Mar 23, 2006 01:14pm | #3

   I have a Hitachi 15 gauge and it's nice.  My 18 gauge is a cheap Grizzly that works OK but has too large of a nail head to see where the nail is going.  I got a deal on my 15gauage and my free Hitachi 18 gauge should be arriving sometime before Xmas.

   Check the archives over at Breaktime, there's much more discussion about nailers on that board.

   Recommending the use of "Hide Signatures" option under "My Preferences" since 2005
3. 
   csacoe | Mar 24, 2006 01:49am | #4

   I prefer Senco, have several of all types and sizes. Porter Cable makes a good one too. If money is an issue, our local Woodcraft has recon P.C.s for 49.00 w/ a1 yr warranty. Check your store or catalog.  But Senco is a good product. Oil-less in any brand is the way to go if you can get it. I noticed on one of my Senco nailers that it's made by SKS.

1. 
   RickL | Mar 24, 2006 03:49pm | #5

   SKS is a Senco designation and not made by other.

1. 
   csacoe | Mar 25, 2006 12:12am | #8

   Thanks, I'am glad to hear they're not that diversified.

   Oh by the way, try 88.7fm WNCW if you haven't yet.

   Edited 3/24/2006 5:34 pm ET by csacoe