Staple guns and sizes of staples, or...

[AZRedhawk44]

...does everything at Harbor Freight suck?


I've got a pair of T50 sized springloaded staple guns that I've used for years at Appleseed events.  I think "T50" is a trademark from Arrow... even in the T50 stapler manual on their website I find no corollary to a gauge size of staples.


I've also got one of these pneumatic nailers for more intensive work, when the spring gun isn't powerful enough and a compressor is the right tool for the job:

http://www.harborfreight.com/20-gauge-wide-crown-stapler-68029.html

I bought it about 6 months ago when I reupholstered the seat on my dirtbike.


That pneumatic nailer claims to be a 20 gauge stapler (hence its name: 20 Gauge Wide Crown Stapler).  To quote the product literature... "Drives 5/32 in. to 5/8 in. long, wide crown staples."  I was running low on staples for a new project... I'm repainting and reupholstering some patio furniture... so I bought some 20ga 1/2" staples.

They don't even fit in the channel of the staple magazine.


It's not the end of the world, it's only $12 worth of staples I bought at Harbor Freight, but WTF is up with staple sizes and staple gun naming conventions?  How wide is "wide crown" versus what must evidently be an as-yet-undiscovered-by-me "extra wide crown?"  There's no effort on the staple manufacturer for HF to label the staples as suitable for a certain class of staple gun. 

I had a handful of T50 staples and used those to continue on my project yesterday, and I'll head out to Home Depot and get more T50 staples to resolve the deficiency of these HF ones.

I just figured that the specification "20 gauge" would be sufficient for a consistent size of staple... that it described the distance between the staple legs not unlike how gauge in railroad speak defines the distance between rails.  Evidently I'm wrong though and "crown" also comes into effect, and gauge only pertains to the size of the wire used to make the staple.  It still leaves me with the extremely scientific and accurate usage of the label "extra wide crown" for my pneumatic stapler that evidently cannot handle 1/2" crown staples.

[AJ Dual]

Yep, 20 gauge is usually a wire thickness specification. It wouldn't automatically mean the size or type of staple otherwise.

[tokugawa]

The gauge is the staple wire thickness, the crown is usually noted by inch sizes in woodworking- IE, 18ga. 1/4" crown, 1" leg.
 It may be the term "wide crown" is specific to some old standard?

[rcnixon]

Or it's made up to avoid patent or copyright restrictions.

Russ

[Kingcreek]

For hanging targets or felt roofing paper, it's hard to beat a hammer stapler aka slap stapler.
I have so far been able to avoid anything other than the T50 type.

[dogmush]

On HF Staples (and most but not all others) gauge is the wire size.  The first numeric inch is usually the leg length and the crown given as a second inch measurement.  So your stapler can handle staples made from 20ga wire with a wide crown and legs up to 5/8" long. HF expects (for some unknown reason*) that you will know that most pneumatic staples are 1/4" crown.  So the 1/2" crowns  are "wide".

These should be what you need:

http://www.harborfreight.com/5000-piece-12-x-12-crown-20-gauge-staples-69760.html

T50 is indeed an Arrow proprietary crown measurement that IIRC is just a tic over 1/2". They should work in your pneumatic stapler.


*Not sarcasm.  Sometimes HF seems to think you are a toddler and explains everything in their lit, other times it seems like they expect you to be a contractor and know the inddusrty standards andbe able to identify them by sight.  There's no rhyme or reason to it. 

[Doggy Daddy]

*Not sarcasm.  Sometimes HF seems to think you are a toddler and explains everything in their lit, other times it seems like they expect you to be a contractor and know the inddusrty standards andbe able to identify them by sight.  There's no rhyme or reason to it. 

Can't imagine why they'd be so inscrutable.   

[AZRedhawk44]

These should be what you need:

http://www.harborfreight.com/5000-piece-12-x-12-crown-20-gauge-staples-69760.html

 

Those are what I bought.

They don't fit the stapler.  1/2" is too wide.

T50 is 3/8" wide, or somewhere around there.  T50's fit it.

It's just funny (i.e. annoying) that HF sells these staples, right next to this pneumatic staple gun, and they don't appear to sell a staple gun anywhere in the store that actually fits these 1/2" crown staples.

[dogmush]

That's weird, but kinda Harbor Freight.  I have an HF pneumatic stapler that uses the 1/2 " staples so they do have one.  No idea what the model number is though.

[K Frame]

You sure your gun isn't adjustable to fit different sizes of staples?

[AZRedhawk44]

You sure your gun isn't adjustable to fit different sizes of staples?

I looked for adjustable rails in the magazine, or some way to remove a rail or make the channel wider somehow.  The notion of it being an "wide crown" stapler that can't use 1/2" wide staples did strike me as rather odd.  Nope, nothing.

No big deal.  I accidentally threw away the receipt while cleaning up around the house last week so I'm out $12, but it's not the end of the world.  I'll stick the staples in the workshop and if I do ever end up with a 1/2" crown stapler then I'll have ammo for it.

[coppertales]

I buy alot of stuff from Harbor Freight.  There is a store 4 miles down the road from me.  I have never had any problems with anything I have bought from them.  The only gripe is alot of times they don't have what is in the sales flyer...........chris3

[Marnoot]

I have never had any problems with anything I have bought from them.

I have bought quite a bit there as well, and the only things I've had problems with are things I didn't think could be screwed up, like a lug wrench. Oscillating multi-tool? No problems. Air tools? Work great. 4-way lug wrench made of "chrome plated drop-forged steel"? If you drop-forge cheap Chinese pot metal, it's still cheap Chinese pot metal.

Was using it to take the lug nuts off my car, and the shaft connected to the lug nut just spun apart. Not at a weld, right in the middle of the shaft, just twisted apart like a slightly dried-out PlayDoh snake. Certainly wasn't due to my great strength, I'm 145# sopping wet. Didn't have a receipt, so I didn't bother trying to return it.

Based on that experience, not that a lug wrench fits this, but I absolutely will not purchase anything there that could result in grave injury if the Chinese "steel" were to fail. No jack-stands, no jacks, no ramps, etc.

[Cliffh]

Sure wish there was a HF closer than 60'ish miles from here.  I've got $90 in gift cert's just waiting to be used.

Been buying stuff from them since the '70's.  Still using the wrenches, oxy/acetylene setup, air tools, elec. grinders (bench & hand-held) etc.  The electric pressure washer did die after over 20 years, and they're no longer selling the head rebuild kit for the 15yr old pancake compressor, so it's not all golden.

Speaking of air compressors, anyone know of a decent, inexpensive 2 gallon compressor with an actual air pump - not one with a diaphragm?

[Hawkmoon]

I have bought quite a bit there as well, and the only things I've had problems with are things I didn't think could be screwed up, like a lug wrench. Oscillating multi-tool? No problems. Air tools? Work great. 4-way lug wrench made of "chrome plated drop-forged steel"? If you drop-forge cheap Chinese pot metal, it's still cheap Chinese pot metal.

Was using it to take the lug nuts off my car, and the shaft connected to the lug nut just spun apart. Not at a weld, right in the middle of the shaft, just twisted apart like a slightly dried-out PlayDoh snake. Certainly wasn't due to my great strength, I'm 145# sopping wet. Didn't have a receipt, so I didn't bother trying to return it.

Based on that experience, not that a lug wrench fits this, but I absolutely will not purchase anything there that could result in grave injury if the Chinese "steel" were to fail. No jack-stands, no jacks, no ramps, etc.

10-4 on that.

Several years ago I had a set of HF 1/2" drive impact sockets. I also had a junker Jeep I had just bought, on which the lug nuts were either badly over-tightened, or just rusted onto the studs. I started to take a wheel off using just a short breaker bar, and the 3/4" "impact" socket shattered into a gazillion (plus-or-minus a couple) pieces. At the time there were no HF stores in my state, so I couldn't easily replace it. So I dug out a standard (non-impact) Craftsman socket, and it took them all off without even breaking a sweat.

I basically regard HF tools as one-time use, and I buy them for jobs on which I expect the tool(s) to get beat up.

[dogmush]

I basically regard HF tools as one-time use, and I buy them for jobs on which I expect the tool(s) to get beat up.

I basically modify this approach a very little.  Stuff I use a lot (Wrenches, sockets, my main compressor, 3/8 and 1/2 impact wrenches and the like) I buy quality US made.  Not only will it last longer, it'll work better the whole time.  Occasional use and/or expensive tools like disk brake compressor, ball joint remover/installer, my big sliding compound Miter saw, the spare air compressor in the tractor shed, Pnuematic staplers I get at harbor freight.  It'll have a shorter number of uses, but even that short lifespan is more than I'll use.

Put some thought into how you will use the tool and HF can give you some great deals and actually have the tools you need for a job.

[tokugawa]

A bar breaking or a socket exploding can have a nasty side effect on your knuckles.....

[brimic]

Yep, I've had an HF impact socket explode on me too. Impact wrenching is a safety glasses mandatory activity.
I had a 10mm 'taiwan' socket break on me last week. Not sure where it came from, it was one of the few strays mixed in with my Craftsman sockets.

[K Frame]

You ever figure out your stapler?

Could it be metric staples?

[AZRedhawk44]

You ever figure out your stapler?

Could it be metric staples?

Basically, it's a T50 sized stapler that cannot advertise that it is a T50 sized stapler because the term T50 is trademarked by Arrow.  T50's are kinda-sorta-7/16ths of an inch wide.  "Wide crown" evidently means 7/16ths of an inch wide.

Still perplexed why one would need a totally different size-format of stapler that is only 1/16th of an inch wider (the 1/2" crown staples I bought).

[tokugawa]

might stem from industry- the medium size cabinet staplers are 7/16 crown , but the wire gauge is a lot larger -16 ga.