Hardwood Floors February/March 2026

By Terry Patton | NWFA HARDWOOD HINTS

Manual Blind Nailing

Have you ever been on a job and forgot the one specific tool you know would save you time or maybe that tool decides not to work? You’re all alone at a hardwood floor installation site and the nearest distributor or tool store is too far away and the customer wanted the job done yesterday. Early on in my career as a floor installer, my finish nail gun stopped working. Keep in mind, this was before the fancy tools we have today existed. I was laying the last couple of rows of 2¼” strip hardwood, pulling up to the wall, and needed my finish nail gun, which wasn’t working. The finish carpenter suggested I should drill pilot holes using a 7/32” drill bit for an 18 gauge cleat or not more than a 1/8” drill bit for a 16 gauge cleat into the hardwood in the nail gap where I needed the cleat to seat. Then I should split the cleats individually, and blind nail them into the floor using my hammer and nail set. I ended up doing all the rooms like this and came back the next day with a new finish nail gun to complete the rip rows. In today’s day and age, we have air tools to do all the blind nailing as we are pulling up to the walls, so this tip may seem obsolete. However, sometimes an “outdated” trick of the trade could end up saving you time on the job.

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WATCH IT! See Terry Patton complete this process in a video on NWFA’s YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram pages.

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PHOTOS COURTESY OF NWFA

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