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With all the wainscoting, beadboard, crown, baseboard, chair rail and every other imaginable kind of trim in this old victorian, the nailer functioned flawlessly. I never counted how many nails you could do on a charge - we never ran it down. This is all covered in the manual, although I don't recall it making a point of thinking about the positioning of the chisel point. Well, it sure isn't light, although I find it comfortable to hold and easy to use, even standing on a step ladder putting up crown molding over my head. Not having to deal with both batteries and gas tilted me in favor of the DeWalt.
Other reviewers has mentioned the DeWalt is heavy. I love it. I wanted the ease of use of a cordless, which pretty much narrowed it down to DeWalt or Paslode. We shot many, many boxes of nails and wore out two rubber noseguards without a single jam.The only issue is shooting thin nails into hard word.
Sometimes you need to turn the nailer so the long edge of the chisel point is across the grain so it cut through it instead of following it.The angled magazine makes it surprisiningly easy to get into small locations. The bottom line. My 26 year old daughter has no problems using it in any position either (it's her house). While most of the wood is pine, it's old first growth southern yellow pine that's almost as hard a oak. If I had one complaint, it's that there's no good position to put it down, other than standing on the battery.
Faced with a major overhaul of a 120 year old house, I wasn't looking forward to doing all the trim with a hammer and nailset, so I purchased a finish nailer. Actually better than my straight magazine brad nailer, which is much smaller overall.Pay attention to which model you're looking at when comparing prices - the 618K has one battery while the 618KA comes with two, and batteries are expensive. I have the KA, and when we were doing trim we never had a problem running out of battery - in fact, many days we didn't have to switch at all. On days when we used it heavily, we'd just swap batteries every few hours when we took a break. Sometimes it'll even make a u-turn, so you need to think about where you put your hands when using this tool. In that position, it's top heavy, so you sure don't want to put it on the top of your step ladder while you're fiddling some piece of crown molding into position. It uses the same nails as the Paslode (in fact, that's all I use since none of my local stores carry the DeWalt nails).
And while the weight didn't bother us using it, it's a lot when it's hanging on your belt by the hook.I like it so much a bought a DeWalt brad nailer when they came out. If you don't pay attention to the direction of the chisel point of the nails relative to the grain, the nail will follow the grain. Same for knots or other defects in the wood. The only negative is the weight, but that never really bothered us when we were actually using it. Unfortunately, I'm not nearly as happy with the brad nailer, but that will be a different review.
It's nice not having to lug around a compressor and being able to nail without cords or hoses. I just bought my second DeWalt DC618 nailer. This nailer has plenty of power, even with hard woods like oak. I do a fair amount of remodeling with my two sons. This nailer has been great. The reason I needed a second nailer is because my son will not give back the nailer he "borrowed" for a very large house rebuild that he is doing. I think a third nailer is probably in our future.It has become an indispensable tool.
The batteries just last forever. I've had my Dewalt cordless nailer for about eight months. I have some pretty neat tools, but I must say, this nailer is my favorite. When it did jam, the nail (last one in the run) was easily removed. This gun helps me do better work, easier work, faster work. I have trimmed out four houses, done a score of other smaller jobs, and the gun ALWAYS works.
OK, as you can tell, I love this nailer. I'm a "former" carpenter, and still do projects at home and for others. If you keep one on the charger while using the other, you'd be hard-pressed to run out of battery life. I'm not sure how many boxes of nails I've gone through.and the gun has jammed FOUR TIMES. That's it. Don't worry about the weight; it's well balanced.
That's enough for me.
I first tried the Black and Decker BDBN1202 (it was cheaper), the first one I received was DOA, the second one nailed inconsistently. I returned it and bought the DEWALT DC618K. All I can say this nailer blows away the Black and Decker, it may cost a little more but it is worth it. Save yourself the trouble buy the DEWALT first.
To bad amazon won`t let you price match,Home depot has it for 300.00 50.00 less than amazon.
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