Hilltop Design, an engineering firm in New Hampshire, has a 21st-century solution for moving around big shop equipment: the hoverpad. Instead of hoping your sorry-ass friends will show up and your dolly and steel toes will make it through one more move without injury, you can use hover technology to get the job done quickly and safely.
I found a new site today called Today’s Concepts, and they’re currently offering this DeWalt heavy-duty brad nailer, stapler, and compressor combo kit for $215. The kit includes a 2.0 SCFM/90 PSI pump, a 2.0 gallon tank compressor, DeWalt’s D51420K stapler, and their D51236K nailer — all with a 3-year warranty.
D55141BNS Combo Kit [DeWalt]
DeWalt Compressor Combo Kit [Todays Concepts]
Street Pricing [Google Product]
Over at Amazon this DeWalt D51238K 5/8″ to 2″ 18-Gauge brad nailer is $65 right now. Features include: 360-degree exhaust, 110 nail capacity, four position vertical slide, low-nail reload indictor, and tool-free jam clearing. Oh yeah, it also comes with safety glasses and carrying case. Note: a couple of different vendors offer this tool reconditioned for $5 less through Amazons “New & Used.”
D51238K Nailer [DeWalt]
Via Amazon
Street Pricing [Google Products]
Harbor Freight is offering this gravity feed blaster gun for $10 right now. I don’t really need one, but at this price I’ll probably pick one up just for the hell of it. The Central Pneumatic #93321 features a 9-ounce hopper, a 5 mm nozzle, and demands a max air pressure of 90 PSI and a volume of 1.7 CFM.
Gravity Feed Blaster Gun [Harbor Freight]
We found some more coupons for in-store use at Harbor Freight. This 125 psi Air Regulator for $14 seems tempting, as does a 12-pack bag of steel wool for $0.49 or a $6 pair of welding gloves.
Coupons, Coupons [Harbor Freight]
Store Locations [Harbor Freight]
Another great deal over at Amazon: a Dewalt heavy-duty 1-1/4″ 18-gauge brad nailer kit for $64.81 with free shipping. The nailer features a nail length capacity of 5/8″-1 1/4″ with a load capacity of 110 nails, a tool-free thumb-wheel for fast depth setting, an over-molded no-mar pad, a side-mounted low nail indicator, and a trigger lock. The kit also includes a set of safety glasses, an allen key and a heavy-duty case.
Via Amazon
D51236K 18-Gauge Brad Nailer [DeWalt]
Street Pricing [Google Product Search]
Specailty nailers sometimes go unnoticed because you can’t tell what they’re for just by looking at them. As Toolmongers we love ‘em, though. Take the Grip Rite GRC-58, for example, which installs crown staples with plastic caps. This seriously rocks if you’re tar papering a roof or doing a bit of insulation wrapping.
Tool guys often like to have bragging rights on the biggest and most powerful tools. Drivers aren’t really any different: more power and noise is pretty cool. A pneumatic driver that spins 1,800 rpm sounds like a good plan then, right?
It’s a normal-looking pneumatic driver as first glance – a 1/4” hex drive system hooked to an air hose charged with 90-120 psi good for 45 – 115 in/lbs of torque. The 1,800 rpm speed is almost certainly a “free-spin” speed, however if the speed under load is anywhere close, that’s about 30 revs per second.
Sick of those 70s-inspired — or maybe that should read “sticker-upcharge-inspired” — pinstripes the dealer added to your brand new Honda? Remove ‘em with a pin striping removal kit.
The kit is really just a 4,000 rpm “Pinstripe Removal Tool” — technically an air powered polisher with a safety lever — and 12 “smart eraser” 3-1/2″ rubber pads. The rubber pads strip the striping off without killing what’s underneath.
Every homeowner should own an air compressor, even if it’s a small one. “Tool guys” own one big enough to drive air tools. (You’ll never go back.) But true Toolmongers have one of these: a retractable hose reel that keeps air lines out from underfoot. (You get extra points for plumbing it to the ceiling first so the hose drops down quick-lube-style.)
Mixing your own paint can be rewarding for any number of reasons: Maybe you want to get that custom color just right yourself, or maybe you just don’t feel like hunting down a salesperson at the local big-box store to stand there look at a chart, turn on the mixer machine and watch it the same way you could. With an air operated paint shaker like this one from Astrotools you can do the same thing — and skip the lines.
History and experience teaches us that there are many different tools needed both on the jobsite and in the shop: tools for driving fasteners are no exception. The Bostitch PN100K Impact Nailer is just such a specialty tool, constructed for driving common bulk nails in tight spaces or for nailing off metal connectors and joist hangers.
It was a pretty straightforward sounding project: paint two rooms in my parent’s house. A fairly simple and unassuming goal, right? My father (who is a Toolmonger like me) recently purchased a Wagner Paint Crew to accomplish said task.
The features sounded great: 3/8 HP. .2 gallons per minute. A two-gallon capacity hopper to increase spray time and convenience. A 25 foot spray hose attached to a professional-grade metal spray gun with a full-size in-line filter. It sounded like a quick and fast thing; We’d be done by halftime, yeah?
When we saw something listed as “tool, air, crud removal” in the “new products” area of the Snap-on website, we just had to know more.
This new tool, the PT280THUGA Air Removal Tool, looks like a pneumatic angle grinder, but it’s actually designed to take a range of rotary stripping discs. For example, a stainless steel “brush-style” disc helps remove PVC, seam sealer, rust, paint, and underbody protection. An optional “rubber eraser” disc can be used to remove decals, pin stripes, double-sided tape, and other adhesives.
It uses Snap-on’s reliable existing planetary gear system, and spins at 3,500 RPM so it’s a little faster than your electric polisher but still slow enough to safely use with brush discs. It routes cooling air for the motor between its housing and liner to keep its grip cool, and the grip itself helps isolate you vibration. You can also adjust the air outlet at the rear of the tool to point it in different directions, and there’s a ten-position power/speed regulator.
When we asked, by the way, Snap-on said that the tool was originally called the “Crud Thug” — hence its unusual part number. Personally, we love the name. Names like this — and like Stanley’s Functional Utility Bar (”Fubar”) — stick with you and accurately describe the tool’s function. Would you remember the “PT280 Air Removal Tool” or the “Crud Thug?” We’d love to see more names like these.
It’s $380 from Snap-on, and it’s available now.
The PT280THUGA Air Removal Tool [PDF: Snap-on]
Around our house summertime means activities, and this means things of all sizes and shapes need to be inflated. Not all of us have room or budget for a high dollar shop air system, but a portable air compressor can be a great solution to the hand pump blues.
A small 2.5hp, 6 gallon compressor like the one pictured here can be had for less than $100 with some careful shopping. Don’t expect to use air tools with it as it doesn’t have the volume of air to drive them, but it’ll do fine for tasks such as filling tires and sports equipment, filling inflatable beds, and (our personal favorite) blowing dust out from difficult to reach places in a vehicle. (Always wear eye protection when doing this, and never direct the airflow directly at your skin.)
With the small footprint and the low cost of a unit like this, it’s worth the invetsment to save all that hand pump action and trips to the gas station air pump.
Some Examples [Froogle]
Posi Locks’ new MVP5 is a machinist’s vise that runs on shop air — compressed air is used in conjunction with a lever and directional valve to move sturdy metal blocks along a track. The movement of the blocks opens and closes the vise with accuracy within .001″ and up to 6000 lbs. of clamping force.
The entire unit is self contained, making it safer to use as no mechanical workings are left exposed to bits of slag or flying debris. The locking block jaws can also be rotated to use all 4 sides for different holding grips and styles, bringing a great deal of flexibility to what was once a single grip devise.
MVP5 Machinists Vise [Posi Lock]
With a thinner head, the “Flathead” lets you bring air ratchet goodness to projects where you’d normally be stuck wearing out your arms wrenching because your standard air ratchet simply won’t fit.
A composite grip separates your hand from the chill of compressed air, and the Flathead’s titanium head makes it one of the lightest and most balanced air ratchets around. Ingersoll Rand also says that moving the forward/reverse switch off the head has the added benefit of easing one-handed use.
The 1215Ti Titanium Flathead Air Ratchet [Ingersoll Rand]
Update: It looks like Craftsman makes a similar ratchet, too, called the Craftsman Professional 3/8-inch Rapid Reverse Ratchet. It’s $149.99 in the latest catalog.
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