Elroy Skimms Posted December 15, 2016 Report Share Posted December 15, 2016 12 hours ago, Denette said: Only complaint about it is that it is a combo stapler/nailer, so if I want to bury the nail heads beneath the surface and cover over with filler it is going to make a staple-wide hole rather than just a pinhole for the nail. I'm not trying to be pedantic, but an 18ga nailer is not a pin nailer. 18ga is a brad nailer and will always leave larger holes. If you want a true pinhole, you should look at a 23ga gun. -E 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Denette Posted December 15, 2016 Author Report Share Posted December 15, 2016 I'm not trying to be pedantic, but an 18ga nailer is not a pin nailer. 18ga is a brad nailer and will always leave larger holes. If you want a true pinhole, you should look at a 23ga gun. -E No worries! I'm new to this particular realm of woodworking. Good info to know. The problem I am talking about, though, is not that the head of an 18-ga nail leaves a big hole, but rather that the firing mechanism of the nailer/stapler is wide enough for staples, so if I give it enough juice to sink the nail in far enough to avoid having to come back to each one with a nail set, it makes a hole with a nail in the left ⅓ and a pointless staple-width area punched into the wood where the top of a staple would be if I were using staples. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JosephThomas Posted December 15, 2016 Report Share Posted December 15, 2016 Maybe you can swap out for a smaller firing mechanism? Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Denette Posted December 15, 2016 Author Report Share Posted December 15, 2016 2 hours ago, JosephThomas said: Maybe you can swap out for a smaller firing mechanism? Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk Do you mean swap out the firing mechanism or swap out the whole air nailer? (As I've said, I'm totally new to air tools) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wdwerker Posted December 16, 2016 Report Share Posted December 16, 2016 Just get a 23 gauge micro pin gun. The ones that shoot 3/8 to 1" pins are quite affordable, $25- $50 .The ones that shoot longer pins get more expensive quickly. There are a few brands that will shoot a 2" pin, mine is a Grex, around $300. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xxdabroxx Posted December 16, 2016 Report Share Posted December 16, 2016 17 hours ago, wdwerker said: Just get a 23 gauge micro pin gun. The ones that shoot 3/8 to 1" pins are quite affordable, $25- $50 .The ones that shoot longer pins get more expensive quickly. There are a few brands that will shoot a 2" pin, mine is a Grex, around $300. This might be an over broad question, but what kind of projects do you use a 23ga nail gun for? I currently only have a 16ga and it is kinda big. I'm trying to decide if my next gun should be a 18 or 23. I've used my 16ga for everything from hanging interior doors and trimming them out to pinning together cabinets. The nails a a fair bit big for cabinet work I think though. I have from 1-1/4" nails to 2-1/2" for it I believe, might be 2". FWIW, I have projects ranging from kitchen cabinets to small boxes coming up in the future. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wtnhighlander Posted December 16, 2016 Report Share Posted December 16, 2016 An 18 ga brad nailer can do SOME projects where the brads are the only fastener, and is marginal for that at best. It leaves a pretty small hole, but is always visible unless filled. 23 ga pins should never be used without glue, but the holes are nearly invisible. Like Norm always said, "just to hold it while the glue dries." Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davewyo Posted December 16, 2016 Report Share Posted December 16, 2016 A 23 ga. is good for mouldings in a cross grain situation like on a solid wood case where you glue the front 4" or so and nail it down at the back. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post wdwerker Posted December 17, 2016 Popular Post Report Share Posted December 17, 2016 I use my longer pin gun to run moldings. If you nail at a slight angle even a headless pin holds quite well. With a little glue it's not going anywhere. If I have to nail where there are no studs I nail at a steeper angle in both directions, which makes an X. Tacking together a one time disposable jig or a stop where a clamp won't reach. We use literally thousands of 1" pins with 1/2" Baltic & glue to assemble the frame we cover with laminate for commercial display shelves, 40 per shelf times 50-75 per batch, you do the math. Any time I've got a small part that's too oddly shaped for a domino a dab of glue and a couple of micro pins does the trick. When something is located where you can't clamp a few pins can be toe nailed to hold it in place while the glue dries. I often sand , stain and finish then use tiny dabs of " Color Putty " or a wax stick to fill any holes that weren't filled with sawdust and disappear during finishing. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Denette Posted December 17, 2016 Author Report Share Posted December 17, 2016 This weather is weird! Today in AR we have a high of 73, and a low of 23. Ive spent the day working in an open garage in shorts and a t-shirt in December. Found out the hard way that my garage is well-insulated because I realized about an hour after opening the garage door (and exchanging 45° interior air for 73° exterior air) that my jointer was literally covered in puddles and rust. Stupid Arkansas. After cleaning that mess up and sealing it with a very thick layer of wax, I got to make some good progress. Today has been a day of great progress on the twin twin bed project! All the plywood is cut to rough dimensions, almost all the joinery for the base sections is done, and the only cause for pause is that I'm waiting on a tool to arrive in the mail. I cut all the dadoes (dados? dadoes? How do you make that plural?) that I felt safe cutting, then ordered a 23/32" router bit off Amazon. Once that gets here I'll rout the rest of the dadoes, and then put together the cabinet-like bases. I cleaned up the dadoes with a jerry-rigged router plane (read: chisel in a block). My garage is really crowded at the moment, so I can't really work on the face frames until I get those bases out of the way. So I'm at a temporary stopping point. As for the materials, I'm liking it better than most plywood. The face veneers are indeed very thin and a bit fragile, and there is the occasional void in the wood, but by and large this plywood has been a pleasure to work with. I will say, though, that working with full sheet goods on a table saw has me really wishing I had a track saw. I have a DeWalt 20vMax circular saw and a shop-made MDF edge guide, which I used for most of the crosscuts on the large sheets to break them down. I usually work with solid-wood furniture, and so until this project I hadn't realized just how handy a track saw might be. I've seen an online tutorial on how to add aluminum tracking strips to the base plate of a circular saw and create a track, which might be doable. Anyway, it's coming along! The big boards have been made smaller. After I run the last six dado(e?)s, we enter the "making boards bigger again" phase. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mat60 Posted December 17, 2016 Report Share Posted December 17, 2016 I have never seen a router plane quite like that one but if it works its fine. I dont have a track saw but edge guide works fine for as often as I need it. If you need tighter dados cant you adjust your blades and shims. Your project is coming along good also. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Denette Posted December 17, 2016 Author Report Share Posted December 17, 2016 I have never seen a router plane quite like that one but if it works its fine. I dont have a track saw but edge guide works fine for as often as I need it. If you need tighter dados cant you adjust your blades and shims. Your project is coming along good also. Paul Sellers has a video on YouTube about how to make a router plane out of a chisel and scrap wood. It's so simple it's hilarious. Thanks for the kind words! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mat60 Posted December 18, 2016 Report Share Posted December 18, 2016 When I looked at your plane I thought you had something other than coffee in your cup. Thanks for the video. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bankstick Posted December 18, 2016 Report Share Posted December 18, 2016 Great looking furniture. FWIW, I would opt for the drawers instead of the baskets. Why? When I retired 7 years ago, SWMBO was still working. Our deal? She worked 8 long and hard hours while I agreed to clean house, do laundry, yard work. Not bad deal as I got a lot of time to fish and hunt. My point? Drawer openings do not require frequent dusting and don't allow dust bunnies to multiply. Need to learn Sketch Up. Off topic, but I cringe when I look at her magazines with all kinds of dust-catchers on open shelves in homes. Interior designers should be made to dust them for the customer. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Denette Posted December 18, 2016 Author Report Share Posted December 18, 2016 2 hours ago, Bankstick said: Great looking furniture. FWIW, I would opt for the drawers instead of the baskets. Why? When I retired 7 years ago, SWMBO was still working. Our deal? She worked 8 long and hard hours while I agreed to clean house, do laundry, yard work. Not bad deal as I got a lot of time to fish and hunt. My point? Drawer openings do not require frequent dusting and don't allow dust bunnies to multiply. Need to learn Sketch Up. Off topic, but I cringe when I look at her magazines with all kinds of dust-catchers on open shelves in homes. Interior designers should be made to dust them for the customer. Yeah, the drawers would be nicer! It's a matter of budget. I may let my clients know a price point for if they want to add drawers at a later date. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elroy Skimms Posted December 19, 2016 Report Share Posted December 19, 2016 On 12/17/2016 at 4:14 PM, Denette said: This weather is weird! Today in AR we have a high of 73, and a low of 23. Ive spent the day working in an open garage in shorts and a t-shirt in December. Found out the hard way that my garage is well-insulated because I realized about an hour after opening the garage door (and exchanging 45° interior air for 73° exterior air) that my jointer was literally covered in puddles and rust. Stupid Arkansas. I had the same thing yesterday (Sunday) in NC. I would imagine the same weather system you had migrated our way. Garage was below freezing and then a warm storm rolled in. 30 degree difference outside and everything inside gets coated with condensation. Though it was nice getting some work done without bundling up for the Arctic (after wiping everything off). But my coats of ARS didn't dry as quickly as I hoped. C'est la vie. -E Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Denette Posted December 20, 2016 Author Report Share Posted December 20, 2016 Well, still no 23/32" router bit, so no progress on the beds themselves today, BUT... I did modify my air nailer. I disassembled it and filed down the firing mechanism so that the part which strikes the nail head protrudes about 1/16" farther than the part that would strike the staple. I tested it and it sinks the nail heads in without marring the wood unnecessarily! So while it remains to be seen whether the gun is still good for staples, it will at least be perfect for this project. I honestly can't think of why I would need a pneumatic stapler anyway. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Denette Posted December 21, 2016 Author Report Share Posted December 21, 2016 My router bit has arrived! I have a Dewalt 621 router, and it's a good router aside from its inexplicable base plate. It's round on 2 ends and flat in between, and the router bit is not centered between the round edges. Here's a picture of the plate: Like I said, it's a solid router aside from its weird base. I don't feel comfortable using the round edge pressed up against a guide because I'm fairly sure it will cause serious problems if the base rotates in relation to the fence, and I am definitely sure that the straight sides, while a little more reliable of a registering surface, will cause severe problems if I bump the router this way or that away from the fence. I'm going to work with it today (I'm a teacher and Christmas break starts today and goes for 2 weeks! We may not get paid much but the time off makes up for it!) and see what I can see. This is the first time I've had the need to use a router for a dado, usually the piece is small enough that I feel comfortable running it across the dado blade on the table saw, but with a piece the size of a twin mattress and no outfeed table, well, I'm playing it safe. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Denette Posted December 21, 2016 Author Report Share Posted December 21, 2016 Update: Just tested a theory about the router base. As it turns out I've been avoiding edge guides for years because I just assumed that an off-center router bit placement made them useless. Until my previous post I had never considered the possibility that the rounded edges on my router base plate are rounded in such a way that they maintain an equal distance from the bit so that if rotation were to occur it would function like a standard round base plate until you rotated off the rounded part and onto one of the flat sides. Here's a test piece on which I rocked the router back and forth over the round edges to test my theory: Look at those pretty straight lines! No worries anymore. Looking to get the bed bases totally finished today and move on to milling up the poplar for the face frame! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sac Posted December 21, 2016 Report Share Posted December 21, 2016 This is like getting play by play of a football game!! Your Sketchup skills make me a little jealous. Great coverage and I look forward to watching this project finish up! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chet Posted December 21, 2016 Report Share Posted December 21, 2016 When you get ready to clamp your straight edge to the work check your clamp placement as well to make sure you won't bump them with the router. Been there, got the t-shirt to prove it. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Denette Posted December 21, 2016 Author Report Share Posted December 21, 2016 14 minutes ago, Chet K said: When you get ready to clamp your straight edge to the work check your clamp placement as well to make sure you won't bump them with the router. Been there, got the t-shirt to prove it. Oh, I didn't hit the clamps. BUT, after two successful dadoes, the location of the third dado made it safer & more natural to put the edge guide on the opposite side of the router. The reversed orientation made the router drift about 1" off course, so I had to reorient myself and rout out the space around it. I filled it with a strip of poplar and as soon as the glue has dried I get to go bring it down to level and re-rout the groove. Thankfully it should be in a low-visibility area, and it will be under a coat of paint, so as long as I get it flush it should be a mistake that I can recover from. Oops. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Immortan D Posted December 21, 2016 Report Share Posted December 21, 2016 If the edge guide is at your left you have to pull the router (walking backwards) to avoid drift. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Denette Posted December 21, 2016 Author Popular Post Report Share Posted December 21, 2016 It didn't turn out bad at all. Smooth to the touch, so the only loss is time. I've done worse. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Isaac Posted December 21, 2016 Report Share Posted December 21, 2016 29 minutes ago, Denette said: It didn't turn out bad at all. Smooth to the touch, so the only loss is time. I've done worse. Had the same challenge on a hidden book shelf project recently. It took a few tries before I really got my method dialed in. That drift is pretty frustrating when it happens. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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