At Lowe's Yesterday

[Von Bickley]

I was at my local Lowe's yesterday and saw the Campbell Hausfeld nail guns on sale.

The box included 4 nail guns:
A 16 gauge finish nail gun
A 18 gauge brad gun
A 18 gauge 1/4" staple gun
A 23 gauge pin nailer

Four nail guns for $89.00

I have never used Campbell Hausfield nail guns and don't know how reliable they are. Just passing this information along to you.

[Harold Burrell]

I was at my local Lowe's yesterday and saw the Campbell Hausfeld nail guns on sale.

The box included 4 nail guns:
A 16 gauge finish nail gun
A 18 gauge brad gun
A 18 gauge 1/4" staple gun
A 23 gauge pin nailer

Four nail guns for $89.00

I have never used Campbell Hausfield nail guns and don't know how reliable they are. Just passing this information along to you.

I have an 18 gauge CH that works quite well. One nuance with mine, though, is that it cannot be used with regular pneumatic tool oil. :confused:

[Curt Harms]

For somebody just getting into the pneumatic fastener game, that seems like a very good deal. I've never used C-H air tools but have had a C-H oilless compressor for 10+ years. It gets occasional use and the pressure switch/unloader was crap, the replacement was worse. The motor and pump have been fine.

[Rich Engelhardt]

W/pneumatic nailers, you pay more for what you don't see.

One of these days if I ever get around to it. I'm going to take some pictures of what a 16 ga CH nailer does to oak door jams and what a 16 ga Porter Cable nailer does to them.
The CH left a lot of little nast hammer marks. The more expensive PC, you really have to work hard at it to get it to leave hammer marks.

The CH can be adjusted to not leave hammer marks and you can also play with the pressure settings to reduce them.
The PC is pretty much automatic in that regard. You set the depth at the least amount of pressure you need, then pretty much forget it until you're done.

I''ve found the above, about paying for what you don't see w/pneumatic nailers, to be pretty much true right across the board.
My "good" Craftsman 18 ga nailer works like my PC 16 ga. Set it/forget it.
My "uility" 18 ga nailers are like the CH. You have to play with them to get good results.
99% of the time w/the 18 ga, I don't care since I'm using them on things that don't show - backs of cabinets and stuff like that.
For "better" work, I drag out the Craftsman or - believe it or not, the Tradesman I picked up from Lowes <--an outstanding "mistake".

Another area where better beats good is in the quality/strength of the components. Better seals, more efficient air motor (operates at less pressure = longer seal life), harder hammers,,,etc. - and - often lighter weight.

My PC 16 ga is an aluminum gun. My 15 ga. Grex is magnesium (Don't buy a Grex - they ain't that hot. 23 ga Grex pinners rock - that isn't true of their other guns. Plus, I don't believe their newer ones are magnesium). Weight isn't an issue right up until you have a whole house of crown to do...then it becomes a huge issue.
Same with my "good" 16 ga. The Craftsman is aluminum and the Tradesman (did I mention that gun was a pleasant "mistake"? If no, then I'll mention it again....wondeful gun that's no longer available...) is magnesium.
Again weight isn't a big deal - until you spend a few hours humping the gun up and down a ladder.

Overall - the CH isn't that great of a deal @ $89
The guns are on the same par with the ones that HF sells.
An 18 ga combo gun - shoots brads and staples - runs about $20 on sale and an 23 ga pinner runs about 5 bucks more.
Since a 16 ga gun is typically something you'll use where appearance is a large consideration and a lot of production is required - think trim and door casing and light duty hollow core prehung door installs, you want something that leaves a nice round properly countersunk fastener.

OTOH - for $89, the CH may not be a bad deal if you don't use nailers all that often & you can take the time to play with the settings and you have the luxury of slowing down so you don't outrun the compressor.
My 16 ga PC runs fine from a 6 gal PC pancake compressor. The 15 ga Grex is just a bit too much for it. So is my Bostitch framing nailer. Both are a lot happier when they're hooked up to my IR "hot dog".

[Pinwu Xu]

Remember that the 18-ga combo (brad and staples) is only useful as a stapler, it'll leave too big a mark when shooting brads