Hammer in nails properly: helpful tips and tricks

Nailing is the easiest way to connect parts and workpieces together. If you drive the nails in correctly and add glue to it, permanent seams are created.

For a nail to hold, it must sit deep enough in the ground. In the case of wood, the adhesive value primarily depends on the clamping force of the wood fibers, which becomes less and less due to drying out - nails with a smooth shaft are clearly at a disadvantage. Nails that have been sunk vertically in the ceiling are pulled out of the slightest load. Here it makes sense to use screws instead of nails. The problem can also appear on the wall if the center of gravity of the load is further away from the wall and nail. Example: Many coats hang on the wide-reaching wardrobe. Part of the weight pulls down, part also in the direction of the nail or hook. If this pull predominates, there is no stopping.

It is therefore wrong to oil or grease nails to avoid rust. Use galvanized nails or pins made of stainless steel, brass or light metal. Lime or cement mortar and wood impregnation can attack hot-dip galvanized and galvanized pins - for example in pressure-impregnated facade boards.

When nailing, always hold the hammer at the end of the handle and do not look at the hammer, but at the nail head. This will prevent you from hitting the thumb. Don't choose too strong nails - a mistake of many beginners. Pre-drilling makes nailing easier:

• Drill thickness: two thirds of the nail shank
• Drilling depth: half the nail length

Professionals tie belts with an open leather pocket during extensive work - so they can grab nails without having to bend down or look. Magnetic nail holders fix wire pins and allow flush driving in without dents in the profile wood. The larger and heavier the object, the longer and thicker you choose the nails.

Little nail help

If you take it exactly and follow the norm, there are no nails, only wire pins. The package contains information on length and diameter, for example 28/65. This means that the wire pin has a length of 65 millimeters and a diameter of 2.8 millimeters.

Nails are 1.8 to 9 millimeters in diameter and are sold by weight. The shaft can be smooth, grooved or screw-like. Grooves increase resistance when pulling out, smooth nails must not be subjected to tensile stress in the end grain.

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8 Show all Hammer in nails correctly

Nail test - The nail must sit sufficiently deep in a stable and solid surface. Consider crumb layers - such as plaster.

Photo: Das Haus / Kirchner

Top position - a sharp nail can split solid wood. Remove the sharpness from the head and with a few hammer blows.

Photo: Das Haus / Kirchner

Cardboard mate - are you handling mini nails? These snap off easily, the hammer lands on the thumb: A cardboard strip fixes the steel pin when it is attached.

Photo: Das Haus / Kirchner

Triple gang - Nails driven in at an angle make the connections stronger. Staggered nails: This way the board remains intact, is not split.

Photo: Das Haus / Kirchner

Camouflage cap - drive the upsetting head of nails into the wood with the countersink. Then level the recess with wood or wax putty.

Photo: Das Haus / Kirchner

Magic chip - Use the chisel to remove the wood chip and nail it in the hollow. Then sink the nail and glue the chip: The nail has disappeared.

Photo: Das Haus / Kirchner

Failure - nail incorrectly or hammered in: pull it out with a short jerk using the pliers. A board underneath prevents dents.

Photo: Das Haus / Kirchner

Accident prevention - Do not turn over long nails that stick out from the back of the board. Bend over a file and lower the tip into the wood.

Photo: Das Haus / Kirchner

The hammer

A hammer is good for many jobs: indispensable for nailing and doweling, for carving and forging, for assembling and aligning components. Its weight is stamped into the hammer head: heavy hammer for large nails, small hammer for small ones.

The hammer's impact is in the head, but develops from the leverage of the handle. It is at least 30 centimeters long. If you hit harder, you have more of it: Triple speed produces nine times the energy value - mathematicians say: The kinetic energy increases with the square of the speed.

The head and the handle must absorb the vibrations that occur during the impact well, otherwise your joints will be put under too much strain. That is why the head is hardened at the fin (tip) and web (blunt end), the middle remains softer - as it were, as it were. Ash wood with parallel annual rings is best suited for the handle.

When the hammer handle has broken off, saw off the handle and drive the rest out of your head with a hardwood dowel or punch. Head to the specialist retailer and ask which handle and steel wedge are suitable for this head or its weight. Once the right head for the hammer weight has been found, support the handle, put the head on and drive it in with a second hammer. Finally, clamp everything with a steel wedge, which you also drive into the handle.