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I'm about to need to drive a lot of staples into wood. I have six chairs I need to re-web. The cushions are fine, but the cheap rubber webbing woven through to support them is no match for six D&D-playing teenage boys. That's at least 8 straps per chair, to be attached twice per end (you staple the webbing on once, then double it over and staple it again), for a total of at least 800 staples needing to be driven through jute webbing into wood. My research tells me what the pros use is some sort of pneumatic stapler; this is well out of my price range. The options are: 1. Well-made hand staple gun. Pros: Drives staples with sufficient force. Cons: That's 20 pounds of force applied by my fragile ladyhands, every time I need to cock the lever. Times 800 staples. I foresee no good here. 2. Electric staple gun. Pros: Less damage to ladyhands. Cons: Every single Amazon review says these can't drive staples for poo poo, unless into very soft wood. 3. Rent a compressor, a hose, and a nailgun (can't find anybody who rents pneumatic staplers locally). Pros: has the power for the job. Cons: Expense, noise, having to learn how to operate complex equipment on the fly, with bonus chance of amusing permanent injuries if I screw things up. Are there any options I'm missing here? Do you have suggestions? I'm about ready to grumble and pay somebody to reweb the chairs, but I think I'd enjoy doing this one myself if I don't have to go broke on tools beforehand.
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Nov 27, 2014 03:35
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Which brand of electric do you have?
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Nov 27, 2014 06:47
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Is there any reason to be wary of a second-hand pancake compressor? As far as I can figure, brand-new small compressors run $100 and upward, and I can find second-hand Porter Cable compressors with hoses on Craigslist for ~$50. This, for instance: http://sfbay.craigslist.org/eby/tls/4758754926.html
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Nov 30, 2014 04:02
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What's wrong with pancake compressors? All I need to run is a staple gun, and not at a rapid clip. It's for reupholstery, not for construction.
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Nov 30, 2014 04:08
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Well, wups. I bought a $10 used-three-times Central Pneumatic (Harbor Freight) 3-gallon compressor from Craigslist because why not. I got it home to find out the max PSI was 100, .6 SCFM at 90 PSI. In short, it's a tire pump. I bought it to do upholstery stapling, because when you're stapling into a hardwood furniture carcass you need some oomph. We'll see how this works with the well-reviewed-on-Amazon pneumatic stapler I got. If it's a dud, I'll either stalk Craigslist for a decent compressor or just spend the extra $50 for the canonical 3.5-gal 135-PSI Porter Cable brand-new. (This puppy: http://www.amazon.com/PORTER-CABLE-PCFP02003-3-5-Gallon-Pancake-Compressor/dp/B00BMUGQNC/ ) Note to self: buy used tools IFF you know enough about the tool to know what you need. At $10, an electric air pump is still a handy thing.
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Jan 11, 2015 19:52
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Mercury Ballistic posted:Surprised there is not a marriage between tools and kitchen appliances. A mixer that is powered by a milwaukee drill sounds great. Back before rural electrification, they sold home appliances that a housewife could power from her farmer husband's outdoor motor. Just hook up the washing machine to the motor, and there you go! Speaking as a cook, you want a stand mixer for exactly the same reason you want (say) a drill press. There's a big difference between mixing a cake for 3 minutes while holding a hand mixer and whipping egg whites for 5-8 minutes with a balloon whip on a stand mixer with planetary motion. And there's no such thing as a dough hook for a hand mixer; they just don't have enough power to be effective. I would never be without my faithful Kitchenaid, which we got (gulp) 34 years ago and is still doing the job splendidly. If your fiancee bakes at all, she has every good reason to want a stand mixer. And you can attach a meat grinder and make your own sausage! (Which I did once, 34 years ago, but whatever. :p )
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Jan 19, 2015 23:26
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But imagine what Lucille Ball could have done with one. Physical comedy to the max. (I have fanged myself cleaning the immersion blender; I should NOT be trusted with a hand mixer.)
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Jan 19, 2015 23:34
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I do bread, too. If you're enthusiastic about baking, you should be watching THE GREAT BRITISH BAKE-OFF (repackaged as THE GREAT BRITISH BAKING SHOW on PBS.) I've learned a lot about baking, and unlike most reality shows, it's kind rather than about watching people undercut one another. And -- relevant to tools! -- it has made me covet a proofing drawer like burning. Also, the guy in the episode last night used washed river rocks in a tray to bake flatbread, and it looked awesome.
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Jan 20, 2015 00:32
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e: Whoops, moved to woodworking thread.
Arsenic Lupin fucked around with this message at 03:03 on Jun 13, 2021 |
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Jun 13, 2021 02:37
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Lee Valley Tools makes great gardening tools. Can I trust the quality of their woodworking tools?
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Jun 28, 2021 03:46
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mds2 posted:Are you kidding? For real, did I miss a joke? I garden. I have never done any woodworking. I'm trying to start, and I needed opinions from people who knew tools.
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Jun 28, 2021 15:30
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Kaiser Schnitzel posted:They are great and you get what you pay for, but they are expensive. There are some decent-ish import brands and also fixing up old tools is an okay option. You might get more specific answers about woodworking tools in the woodworking thread. Oh! I didn't realize this was just the power tools thread.
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Jun 28, 2021 16:46
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We're moving to a new house (whoo!) with a well and septic system. Where we're moving (North California coast), the power sometimes goes out for days. We need to buy and install a generator to keep the well, refrigerator, possible chest freezer, and house lights going. How do I figure out how to size a generator, and what are reliable brands?
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Jul 3, 2021 18:30
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:Residential solar is extremely common in California, but you'd also need some means to store that power, and batteries are expensive. Either that, or you need to be able to do all of your power-consuming work during the day when the panels are generating. A solar array that's powerful enough to run a household is also going to be fairly large, which may or may not be an issue depending on your location and the shape of your house. Arsenic Lupin fucked around with this message at 17:28 on Jul 4, 2021 |
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Jul 4, 2021 17:26
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Vim Fuego posted:The American DRM 
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Aug 4, 2021 16:18
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If you're willing to do electric, I like my Sun Joe. It copes with moderately clay-y soil if you're willing to do several passes, getting deeper each time. The big problem in my yard was that there had been multiple layers of sod, and nowadays sod is grown on a poly thread mesh base, which wraps itself around the blades. 
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Aug 6, 2021 16:24
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If you were buying a set of drill bits for household chores, no precision required, durability a plus, which brand would you buy?
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Aug 27, 2021 03:08
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Where I live, for small jobs the contractors say they can't schedule it in advance, but they'll call me on a day when they finish a big job early and fit me in. You might try asking local contractors if they'll do that.
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Sep 1, 2021 17:41
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Uncle Enzo posted:The stupid old freezer-on-top design is the most efficient since the cool air is put into the freezer, where it then just falls through an adjustable damper into the fridge. No pumps, just a box with a chiller and doors. Our house came with brand-new cheap appliances. The fridge works fine but is freezer-on-top; the washing machine is a combined stacked washer-on-dryer single unit, rather than being two separate units stacked. The washer is not high-efficiency, which is a big drat deal because we're on a well. It also has an agitator, which is hard on clothes. This has been a vacation house for decades, so there's no dishwasher. It's an old house, so the countertops are not at a standard height; furthermore, they are a solid slab of cast stone, which would be a royal pain in the rear end to cut or to raise. The freezer is okay for keeping ice cream, but not great for "Let's make a pot of chili/vegetable soup/tomato sauce and save the leftovers for later," or, just as important, "Look, they've got chuck at $2.50, let's split that up and freeze half." So. Long-term: replace washer and dryer. Longer-term, optional: replace fridge. Right now: dishwasher and chest freezer. I did massive amounts of measuring today, and found 1 (one) dishwasher that could fit under our counter, a Bosch. It's short because it's ADA-compliant. I also found 1 (one) freezer that would fit in the storage niche on the outside of our house. It's a GE garage-ready 7 cu. foot chest freezer. I ordered both of them, because the carpenter is finally available to rebuild the cabinets leaving a dishwasher-shaped hole. When will the plumbing/electric company be able to install the dishwasher line and electricity? Scheduling person: "We talk about you every week at our Thursday meeting." But it doesn't matter, because the dishwasher will be here, at best, October 8th. The freezer will be here, at best, November 18th. Bosch dishwashers are great. That is all.
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Sep 4, 2021 03:56
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My KitchenAid stand mixers are totally tools. 
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Sep 4, 2021 04:08
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If you're going super-high-end, consider Thermador; they have excellent reliability per Consumer Reports (which doesn't rate SubZero any more); I've heard bad word-of-mouth about SubZero in recent years.
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Sep 4, 2021 18:33
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canyoneer posted:"why does this tree smell like Bradford pear all of a sudden?"  The electrician who came to do some minor work at the house yesterday had a portable bandsaw, little tiny thing (relative to a real bandsaw) that you could carry by hand. I think it was a Makita.
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Sep 23, 2021 20:01
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Johnny Truant posted:
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Oct 17, 2021 17:56
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Mr. Mambold posted:once the new has worn off.
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Oct 26, 2021 20:31
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For label making, get any Brother P-Touch, a waterproof tape, and never look back. Unlike the kind that emboss, they don't tend to separate from the surface over time.
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Oct 31, 2021 03:31
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tracecomplete posted:Just a few, and just text. Letter punches look like a fun thing to have around regardless. Thanks! Sorry, I was replying to the Dymo conversation, not to your table.
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Oct 31, 2021 17:03
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Can I get ID on a couple of tools? Is this just an attachment to a shop vac? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKZEMPwEYCQ&t=30s What's this? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKZEMPwEYCQ&t=589s
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Nov 2, 2021 16:55
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http://www.kylesconverter.com/length/cubits-to-rods
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Jan 29, 2022 17:11
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I must share the single silliest tool I have ever seen. https://www.leevalley.com/en-ca/shop/home/personal-accessories/carabiners-and-keyrings/56683-rimroller?item=99W6846
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Feb 19, 2022 17:58
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I need to buy a string trimmer for out-of-control weeds. I want electric because it's a tiny yard. Anybody got a favorite brand?
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Apr 4, 2022 05:14
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stealie72 posted:And a rubber or leather mallet for whacking things that aren't nails.
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Jun 7, 2022 16:29
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I just bumped into Michael K Woodworks on Etsy and thought of y'all. He makes beautifully turned and finished replacements for Stanley and Lie Nielsen plane handles and knobs.
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Jul 2, 2022 01:45
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A decade or so ago my mom brought me back this pair of shears from Japan. I have no idea what they're made of except obviously some sort of iron-based material. They're rusting. Can I use Naval Jelly to clean them, then mineral oil afterward? What's best?
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Aug 26, 2022 20:28
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I just hung our TV after a TV-less year in the new house. The impact driver paid for itself in just that one task. Holy cow, that thing can drive steel. Or whatever lag bolts are actually made of. Anyway, TV mount went straight into the rock-hard studs. Thanks for the rec, thread. I don't see an appropriate thread in Serious Hardware/Software Crap. Can anybody recommend a trustworthy brand of power bar? I need one that can handle an Instant Pot (call it 1200 watts), and the reason I do is that the instant pot isn't on a countertop, it's on a worktable, and the tiny cord is not long enough to reach a wall outlet.
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Aug 28, 2022 22:30
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They are also fantastic for pounding meat flat. No, not that way.
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Sep 3, 2022 19:41
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Two questions on drill usage. 1. I have delicate computer toucher hands, not strong work-hardened builder hands. When I try to hold a screw to drive it with an impact driver, even on a low speed, the screw threads hurt my fingers and I can't hold it steady. What, besides the first sentence, am I doing wrong? 2. I foolishly used the mounting screws that came with two devices (why? Pure stupidity) and two of the Phillips heads thoroughly stripped, one per mount. If I ever get up the energy to remove them and reinstall, what's the name of the thingy I use to drill out the screw?
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Sep 4, 2022 00:12
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Elem7 posted:To help with that you can get drill bit holder/extensions with either a sleeve that extends to fit over a screw or a magnetic tip to give it extra holding power on the screw. I would be drilling pilot holes a lot more often, except that many of my walls won't yield to anything other than an impact driver.
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Sep 4, 2022 02:49
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Hot drat, and thank you.
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Sep 4, 2022 16:18
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Trabant posted:They (and Woodcraft) were my first place to check but I couldn't find anything that looked right. I'll just have to go into their stores and ask the old-timers behind the counter if they carry anything like it. Lee Valley is your friend.
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Sep 27, 2022 18:51
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The Brusso one snaps, doesn't it?
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Sep 27, 2022 22:16
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