Air Compressors

[HexusOdy]

As a Christmas present to myself I'm thinking of getting an air compressor and a headless pin nailer to replace the electric Tacwise brad nailer I have at the moment that I never use (because it's under powered, needs two hands, and is a pain in the %^$).

Realistically I'm never going to use it for anything more strenuous than nailing although I want to be able to run all nailers on it, not just pin nailers so I'm thinking minimum 7cfm, 120psi max. I don't want anything huge so I'm thinking a 6 litre tank will be enough for a nailer but there are not many options that cover those 2 specs. Nearly everything I can see with 7cfm+ has a minimum 25 litre tank.

I was wondering what other people use here with their nailers?

 

[Duncan A]

Bostitch do a range of compressors with smaller reservoirs e.g the RC-10-U. Most other manufacturers do similar small models. Be careful with the cfm figures as they drop off with pressure. They're all pretty noisy unless you go for something like a Bambi, but then you won't the cfm that you need.

Duncan

 

[Glynne]

Whilst you might only currently be thinking of using it to drive nailers, you might want to consider if it would drive a paint spray in the future? I have an old very small compressor from Screfix which is fine for a nailer and stapler, but won't drive a spray and given my time again, I would have bought a better one at the time.

 

[flh801978]

Bigger the better are air compressors generally
I have a few small silent ones (Bambi's) for indoors tasks such as pinning airbrushing light spraying
And a 14cfm 50 litre tank portable v twin for bigger jobs and a 15cfm 150 litre hydravane for general air in garage and bead /sand blasting tasks

I was doing a lot of nailing this year making a shed and i could get only about 10 nails nailed before the portable one kicked in to recharge so basically it was running a lot... lots of noise..

Ian