When you are about to carry out a DIY job it is absolutely essential that you have a clear understanding of exactly what tools and materials you will need before you decide to get started. This is something which so many people fail to do properly and the results are very rarely good. One material in particular which is often substituted are nails, and it is very easy to assume that all nails are made equal, this is not the case at all. I learned this the hard way some years ago when I replaced the need for coil roofing nails for some brad nails, which as you can imagine did not give me the look or the finish that I was after. Worse still I had to redo the entire roofing after this gaffe.
The point is that nails are not all the same, and here is why it is important that you recognize the difference.
The Misconception
There are some nails which are preferred to others for no other reason than the finish which they give, and this is what makes people think that all nails are like this and therefore they can be interchanged if you are not too bothered about the finish. The reality is however that there is an enormous array of nails out there and they vary not only because of the finish which they give, but also because of the way in which they hold pieces together.
Doing The Job Right
There is no doubt about the fact that if you use the wrong nails you will seriously run the risk of your project falling to pieces once it is done. A fine example of this would be if you are using a light timber such as chipboard. If you were to use a heavy gauge nail in such a piece of timber then it will not be long before it cracks entirely and you are left with a broken piece of wood on your hands. There is absolutely no point in running this risk and the best case scenario is to instead research which nails it is that you need and then use them for the job.
Injuries
Make no mistake about the fact that nails can be seriously dangerous if you don’t use them in the right way. There are many stories about people who have used certain nails in a nail gun when they were the wrong gauge, and the result is that those nails fired off into all different directions when they tried to fire them into the wood. There are also tales of people who have tried to use wood nails to put in metal sheets and that has also resulted in some level of injury. The point is that there is no reason to run the risk of injury simply because you didn’t want to go and get the right nails for the job.
Always be sure that you focus on getting the right tools for the job in hand.