SIGforum.com    Main Page  Hop To Forum Categories  The Lounge    Do air impact wrenches (and other air tools) still have a role in your shop?
Page 1 2 
Go
New
Find
Notify
Tools
Reply
  
Do air impact wrenches (and other air tools) still have a role in your shop? Login/Join 
Member
Picture of sigcrazy7
posted Hide Post
Milwaukee Fuel tools have ruined me. I rarely bother to drag out an air line anymore. Only time I use air now is for the 1" impact hammer, and some speciality tools like air chisel, needle scraper, and high speed sander. For everything else, the cordless tools get the nod. This goes for corded electric tools also.



Demand not that events should happen as you wish; but wish them to happen as they do happen, and you will go on well. -Epictetus
 
Posts: 8200 | Location: Utah | Registered: December 18, 2008Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Staring back
from the abyss
Picture of Gustofer
posted Hide Post
I've been entertaining pulling the trigger on one for some time. It wouldn't get a ton of use (lug nuts, lag screws, etc...), but is this the one I want?

https://www.amazon.com/Milwauk...kee+18+impact+wrench

(I'm a fan of Milwaukee tools)


________________________________________________________
"Great danger lies in the notion that we can reason with evil." Doug Patton.
 
Posts: 19975 | Location: Montana | Registered: November 01, 2010Reply With QuoteReport This Post
member
Picture of henryaz
posted Hide Post
 
I still use air a lot, but not so much the impact tool. I use two die grinders (regular size and pencil size), chisel, cut-off tool, reciprocating saw, tire chucks, and just a plain blow gun is the default tool on each manifold. Clean out the garage? Pull both vehicles outside, open all doors, crank the pressure up to about 150 psi, and use the blow gun to blow out the premises, all debris to the outside desert. Surprising how much dog hair accumulates especially considering how little time the dogs are in the garage.
 
 
Posts: 10778 | Location: South Congress AZ | Registered: May 27, 2006Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
posted Hide Post
Air tools plus my 80 gal 18scfm IR air compressor continue to do most of the work I rely on power tools for.


-------------
$
 
Posts: 7655 | Location: Mid-Michigan, USA | Registered: February 17, 2006Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
Picture of Perception
posted Hide Post
The newer Milwaukee Fuel impact is up to 1400 Ft-Lbs now I believe. Can't say I see much use for most air powered impacts anymore.




"The people hate the lizards and the lizards rule the people."
"Odd," said Arthur, "I thought you said it was a democracy."
"I did," said Ford, "it is."
"So," said Arthur, hoping he wasn't sounding ridiculously obtuse, "why don't the people get rid of the lizards?"
"It honestly doesn't occur to them. They've all got the vote, so they all pretty much assume that the government they've voted in more or less approximates the government they want."
"You mean they actually vote for the lizards."
"Oh yes," said Ford with a shrug, "of course."
"But," said Arthur, going for the big one again, "why?"
"Because if they didn't vote for a lizard, then the wrong lizard might get in."
 
Posts: 3509 | Location: Two blocks from the Center of the Universe | Registered: December 30, 2004Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
Picture of cparktd
posted Hide Post
I have a couple air tools collecting dust somewhere... The only service my air compressor sees now is airing up tires and running an air nailer.

But I'm more geared to construction, wood working now. I'm
mostly cordless.
All Milwaukee. All 18v Fuel except the 12v oscillating saw.
Need to add a jig saw to the list.

Angle grinder
1/4 impact driver
1/2 impact
1/2 drill
circular saw
sawzall
leaf blower
flashlight
oscillating saw

Charging simply isn’t an issue.
Extra Batteries. One is ALWAYS on the charger and waiting at ALL times. Take one off to use, or because I notice it’s charged, and I put another one on to charge.

The 1/2 inch impact spins off lugnuts and my commercial class zero turn mower blades like they were only on hand tight.



If it ain't woke... don't fix it.
 
Posts: 4117 | Location: Middle Tennessee | Registered: February 07, 2013Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Cat Whisperer
Picture of cmr076
posted Hide Post
at home I use battery powered tool, at my shop in a professional setting, I don't see air tools being replaced for a long time.


------------------------------------

135
├┼┼╕
246R
 
Posts: 3901 | Location: SE PA | Registered: November 13, 2010Reply With QuoteReport This Post
I Am The Walrus
posted Hide Post
quote:
Originally posted by cparktd:
Charging simply isn’t an issue.
Extra Batteries. One is ALWAYS on the charger and waiting at ALL times. Take one off to use, or because I notice it’s charged, and I put another one on to charge.


Very true. Battery prices are coming down. To have multiple batteries is wise.

The compressor does have to charge. Some can take a while to build up enough pressure. They're noisy, too.


_____________

 
Posts: 13047 | Registered: March 12, 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
posted Hide Post
60 gal 5.7 hp air compressor and all the tools to use it up.

I have a 12v compact drill/driver, but I use air for everything else.


Sig P226 .40 S&W
Sig SP2022 9mm
RIA 1911 Gov't .45
...and more
 
Posts: 719 | Location: Maryland | Registered: April 30, 2015Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
Picture of erj_pilot
posted Hide Post
Have a Sears Craftsman 64 (I think) gallon compressor. I like to rotate my own tires from time to time on my rock-n-rollin' Corolla and the air impact wrench makes the job a snap.



"If you’re a leader, you lead the way. Not just on the easy ones; you take the tough ones too…” – MAJ Richard D. Winters (1918-2011), E Company, 2nd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne

"Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil... Therefore, as tongues of fire lick up straw and as dry grass sinks down in the flames, so their roots will decay and their flowers blow away like dust; for they have rejected the law of the Lord Almighty and spurned the word of the Holy One of Israel." - Isaiah 5:20,24
 
Posts: 11052 | Location: NW Houston | Registered: April 04, 2012Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Obviously not a golfer
Picture of g8rforester
posted Hide Post
As a rank-amateur home mechanic, I have exclusively used battery-powered stuff for many years. However, I have been looking to expand my repertoire into less-rank-amateur stuff, and as such, been exploring this very question.

Since I already had some Bosch Li-ion tools, I added a Bosch 1/2 impactor, and a Milwaukee M12 3/8 ratchet. Both for less than the price of a compressor and the respective tools.

For someone that is just looking into setting up a shop, I'd go battery all the way. Sure the tools are maybe very slightly larger in some dimensions, but you aren't tied-down to hoses, and you don't have a loud-ass compressor harshing your mellow.
 
Posts: 2438 | Location: Winter Garden, FL | Registered: September 04, 2006Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Oh stewardess,
I speak jive.
Picture of 46and2
posted Hide Post
Definitely. Big fan.

I like cordless, too, of course.
 
Posts: 25613 | Registered: March 12, 2004Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
posted Hide Post
quote:
Originally posted by MNSIG:
quote:
Originally posted by egregore:
Electrics are handy sometimes and supplement air tools, but, to use the example you gave, no electric impact gun can match this:


Actually, the Dewalt has 1200 lb ft of breakaway torque, so it's very close. As a homeowner, I also don't have a compressor that can sustain 8CFM. I understand that it would be different in a pro's auto shop where the tools are used constantly for really big jobs. The hammer is one tool that cordless can't duplicate (yet).

Yup. I have the dewalt and it's a beast. Very nice and will take off, just about anything.
 
Posts: 635 | Location: Michigan | Registered: November 18, 2009Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Member
Picture of bushpilot
posted Hide Post
I have a lot of Milwaukee and DeWalt corded and cordless that I use a lot.

However...Being in the aviation field I have a lot of money invested in air tools and special tools as well. Air tools are very light and run cool when I am rebuilding a wing or fuselage where there are about a million rivets to drill out. Every tool has a place and a job and each one of us guys here on this thread have their own jobs for their tools. Have fun and enjoy your shop time!


****************************************************W5SCM
"We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution" - Abraham Lincoln

"I have been driven many times upon my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go" - Abraham Lincoln
 
Posts: 1143 | Location: Little Rock, AR | Registered: January 22, 2003Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Cigar Nerd
Picture of Jaywendland1981
posted Hide Post
As a Mechanic I have both, top of the line IR air tools and snap-on electric air ratchets and impacts, from 1/4" to 1/2" and while the electrics have their place, they are handy as hell, they still cant beat the torque and power of air. My co worker has the Milwaukee fuel line of impacts and they are pretty damn good but maybe a step or 2 down from the Snap on stuff.

My newest 1/2 air impact will break loose anything! Honda crank bolts beware. It hasn't let me down yet.


There will be whores, tits and sex.
 
Posts: 4305 | Location: Houston, Tx | Registered: January 30, 2009Reply With QuoteReport This Post
  Powered by Social Strata Page 1 2  
 

SIGforum.com    Main Page  Hop To Forum Categories  The Lounge    Do air impact wrenches (and other air tools) still have a role in your shop?

© SIGforum 2024