Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)I bought the 402P Porta-Nailer and 10,000 nails. Just finished installing 740 sf. of 3/4" Red Birch hardwood. No adjustment was required on the nailer as mentioned in an earlier review - nor could I see how one would adjust this nailer.
I nailed until the cartridge was empty every single time - no problem. I actually liked the ratcheting mechanism, despite reading poor reviews about this. The ratcheting mechanism allows you to take smaller swings when in a closet or close to the wall - allowing you to get one and possibly two extra rows nailed before hand nailing was necessary. Be careful when nailing close to a wall. I was a bit careless at first and took some good chunks out of the drywall when nailing close to the wall.
The nailer worked flawlessly. I averaged 75 sf/1000 nails with 3 1/4" wide flooring on a 6" nailing schedule. The box of 10,000 nails did come with the corners a bit crunched, which meant broken rows of nails, but I was able to feed the broken rows into the nailer and use them all up with no problems. I did not get a single jamb in the entire 740 sf. All nails drove flush, absolutely none sticking out.
I found that most nails would set with two swings. You could do it in one swing if you wanted, but I found that a weaker swing followed by one last hard swing seemed to pull the floor together a bit tighter. It was still necessary to pry some of the warped boards over with a pinch bar. This nailer won't straighten out the severely warped boards.
I found it neccessary to hand nail the first and last 12" due to the geometry of this nailer. Note that I did not order the face nailer. I did all of my face nailing by hand.
My only beef was that the wooden handle on the hammer was extremely rough - would rip your hand apart in no time - very poorly done in my opinion. I found it necessary to buff the handle smooth with a flap sandpaper wheel before using it. I would recommend that you spend the 10-15 minutes to do this before using the hammer. The rubber tip on the nailer came off once during the job, but was easy to pop back on.
If I had to do it again, I would certainly buy this nailer and would not hesitate to recommend it to anyone. I shopped around and the nails and nailer were significantly cheaper (about 60%) of the price of purchasing them locally. This is my first hardwood floor install and I found it relatively easy to install. Note that I also used a table saw + miter saw to install the hardwood.
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