Do you do a lot of home Do It Yourself (DIY) work? Or perhaps you build the odd item of wooden furniture? Or maybe you are a commercial trades person.
Well if you fit into any of the above categories then the chances are that you probably use a lot of nails in your work. Now most of us just choose to use a hammer to put them in, yet when we have a lot of them to put in, it can be time consuming and very labor intensive. Particularly when making furniture or putting up a stud wall.
So why not look at buying and using a nail gun instead. Despite the term “Gun” being in their name they are not dangerous if used correctly, indeed unless the safety switch is activated, which can only be done by placing the nail gun hard up against the object you want to fasten in place, then it is impossible to fire a nail out accidentally.
They come in mains powered versions or cordless battery operated ones. The battery powered nail guns cost more but give a far greater flexibility of where you can use them, such as on a rooftop for putting down new roof slates, where having no cable to trip over is far safer. The only downside is the life of the battery, that said most are designed to be put to work all day long.
They can be fitted with a wide variety of nail lengths to suit virtually any job. To operate them you simply place the head of the gun up against the item that you wish to fix in place and then pull the trigger. This then causes the nail to be fired into the wood in just one hit, so no more having to take several blows to get the nail into place. They are also very accurate and avoid the risk of hitting your hand with a hammer as can happen with normal nail placement.
The nails are inserted into the nail gun on a paper or plastic strip. Commonly 23 gauge nails are around 10 to 30mm long, although it is possible to buy 50mm long nails. 18 gauge nails vary from 16 to 50mm long.
Moving up another thickness to 15 or 16 gauge nails, they can be bought in lengths from 16 to 64mm.
The thickest nails are what are known as “Full head” nails and can be up to 90mm long. So as you can see nail guns are suited to a wide range of applications.
For more information on fixings and fasteners why not take a look at Fix8 Fasteners. You can also find a large selection of Fixings and Fasteners at Fix8 Ltd
