I Just Invented a Tool You Can't Buy... Anywhere!

OK, that was a bit clicky-baity. You can, just not at a Bunnings, Habour Freight, Amazon, etc. What you can buy is some stainless steel capilliary tube of, say, 100mm of OD 5mm x ID 3mm and a 120mm length of 3mm stainless steel rod. Spray a bit of silicone lube down the bore of the tube, slip the tube over the nail you need to drive out then pull and whack the top of the rod with a hammer. Et voila! Exactly the same job done for under AU$15 (what I've just spent) that currently needs a $300 air tool and an equally expensive air compressor!

Let me backup and explain. I love pallet wood. You know, pull apart shipping pallets with a jemmy bar, remove the nails and make stuff. That second stage is more PITA than bread! By the time you wrench plank from rail, the nails are bent up and you just know the bastard will bend rather than drive through. You might straighten them with pliers, but they'll still bend when you hit the pointy end. I was just doing this on Wednesday. It's frustrating, you can't leave the nails in if they break, because you can't risk your saw blade striking one during a cut! So you write that plank off.

My clever tool does the job the same sort of way as a an air powered nail remover, it sleeves and straighten the nail and supports a punch firmly on the nail point, so that an impact can push the nail back out without bending it. Pallet nails are usually flatheads and are driven to countersunk, the heads snag on the wood, making it harder still and the nail even more likely to bend. By sleaving the nail and having the sleeve support the punch, you can hammer the nail out, everytime. Everytime!

Lets have a look at the parts...

On the left is the 5mm outside diameter tube, the "tool sleeve." Next is the "punch" that will drive the nail out, guided by the sleeve. Next shows how they come together.

So lets look at how you use it, here's a plank with a nail in it...

Step 1: place the sleeve and punch over the nail

The tool... lets call it "the undriver," is slipped over the pointy end of the nail to be removed and straightens it, the actual punch is slipped down the sleeve, the user holds the sleeve and whacks the top of the punch with a hammer, driving it and the nail down, back through the wood...

Step 2: hit the punch (inner) with a hammer while holding the sleeve (outer)

The rest is pretty self explanatory.

Step 3: the nail is driven out of the wood, without bending, and can be pulled out from the other side with a claw hammer

The parts can be bought on Ali, Amazon, probably Temu FFS, and eBay (where I've ordered mine) in varying sizes to suit different size nails, but pallets seem (to me, at least) to be knocked together with 2.5mm nails, hence the 3mm punch and 3mm bore tube. The capilliary tube comes in 4mm outside diameter and 2mm bore for smaller nails, as well as 6mm OD and 4mm bore for framing nails. Likewise the stainless steel rod comes in 2, 3 and 4 mm diameters for the tool's punch. A set of three!, Just like your nail punch set!

Also, as this helps to keep the nails straight, the nails are more likely to be reusable! Recycle your pallet nails, as well as your pallet wood!

If you like this idea enough to thank me, feel free to buy me a coffee via PayPal. Make out your AU$5 equivalent to filthynoisesmusic@gmail.com because sharing is caring and I cared enough to let the world have this idea for free, rather than patent it like a filthy capitalist and sell it for an absurd markup. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you free wood and free nails for less than the cost of 3 cappucinos at Melbourne, Australia, prices, instead of needing an expensive air hammer and an expensive compressor to do the same thing.