Just as strong. Haven't seen a house or addition nailed by hand in 27 years. If you are framing something....use a nail gun. If you have never used one....be very careful. That should be your only concern, not the strength of hand nailing compared to gun nailing.

 

I prefer to use nail gun...think its better .. saves on arm and shoulder...Iam 53 yrs young....still older...:laughing::laughing::laughing:

 

I've gunned together several hundred homes over the last 25 years and hand banged close to another fifty.

Every one of them is still standing.

The method of nailing should not be a factor. The attention to proper nailing should always be a consideration.

 

I can think of no good reason to frame a house any more with hand nails,
Inless you do it yourself you would be hard pressed to even find someone willing to do it that way, and if you did it would cost far more in labor.
New nails have glue on them that's heat sensitive and sets in a second. Just try and pull one out.
A simple job like sheathing can be done at least 10 times faster.

 

.......

Comparing hand nailing to gun nailing is like comparing cutting wood with a handsaw compared to a circular saw....there's no comparison.

 

The only plus to hand nailing is it tends to get things tighter. But as lone said- proper nailing techniques produce just as good results

 

thanks for all the input everyone

 

on every house being framed there are times when certain things do need to be hand nailed and things that get gun nailed.


i like to tack things together by hand when you have to check the fit of something, easier to pull apart than digging out a gun nail that is sunk. also for tacking the corners of sheets of plywood.. hand nailing draws it down to the framing, from there you can nail it off with the gun

 

My wife and I built our log home by ourselves. While we did all the trim work with a finish nailer, we did all the framing by hand. It's just somehow more satisfying to do it that way. I'm 63, and had no trouble swinging a hammer.

We have done several builds with Habitat for Humanity, and all of those were framed by hand as well. I think that's more because they don't want unskilled volunteers messing with a framing nailer and getting themselves hurt.

 

Time is money in the building trades, and guns are faster. Also, most gun nails have an adhesive coating that activates from the heat of jamming the nail home. They hold better. But several mentioned nailing technique, you can stick a lot of nails in a piece of wood, with a hammer or gun. If not in the right place, they don't do much.

 

most gun nails have an adhesive coating that activates from the heat of jamming the nail home. They hold better.

Regular sinkers also have an adhesive coating. To me, the only advantage of a nailer would be the time it saves. But, then, I'm not in the construction business.

 

It's one thing to hammer one house together. Spending a career doing it is another matter.

I spent the first few years of my carpentry career framing, siding and trimming without the advantage of nail guns.

Time is one aspect of the gun advantage, but there are more benefits.

Using a gun tends to give a much cleaner, more professional end product with less splitting and zero hammer tracks.

With proper training, guns are much safer and result in fewer injuries. I've never shot myself with a gun in over 20 years of using them.

In the few years I spent hand nailing, I lost my thumbnail so many times it doesn't even hurt anymore.

I also had chronic joint pain in my fingers, wrist, elbow and shoulder when nailing by hand, not to mention lower back pain from being folded in half for much longer to complete the same task.