A friend asks: My dad needs to get his nail gun repaired and he rather have a shop fix it than fix it himself. What is the best place to take it for repair?
So this is a common question. Where do you go when your high dollar Nail Gun brakes. Well the first thing is if you don’t feel you are up to doing the work you should look into having a repair shop do the work for you. Nail Guns can be dangerous if you make a mistake with the safety options so consider this the best recommendation.
The next thing is finding a repair shop in your area to take the nail gun. I would suggest that you find the make and model of the nail gun and find the serial number if it is still on the sticker. If the gun is under a year old it most certainly is covered by warranty but what a lot of people don’t understand is many are covered for life.
Visit the Manufacturer’s Website and if you can find the manual and see if it has a warranty description. It might say some parts are fully covered and others for a year. Anyway you look at it you should always ask them to repair it under warranty.
Just say Can you fix this under Warranty. Even if they say no it is better than just asking them to fix it and charge you full price because parts and labor can be expensive.
Next you say Please give me an estimate of repairs before you start if its not fully covered. This is important because if you had a really expensive part that needs replacing you might be better off buying a factory reconditioned tool or a new tool. You want to go with a new tool if the repair is over 50% of the cost of a new tool.
So the best place to go for repairs is the Factory Certified Repair Shops. Some of them are run by the company and others are private repair shops that have gone through certification. Often smaller shops in rural areas are factory certified and normally they perform the same warranty work but it is also possible to UPS or FedEx your tool to the Factory Shop.
Final Note
Many tools you can fix yourself but there are some that you don’t want to take a chance with. A Nail Gun of any type or size is one of those tools. Even a Brad Nailer that misfires could send you to the emergency room.
Never operate your tools if they are causing you problems. Either stop and figure out what is wrong or just end the day early. And there are always hammers…..
I have seen a lot of damaged tools covered by warranty even though they probably shouldn’t have been. That means always ask. They might have an in house reason to repair your tool for free and often they use the repair for research and for recall information.