Hi,

I have a serious problem and would appreciate greatly your help!

I have 2 layers of plywood as subfloor total 15/16". I am installing 3/4 hardwood floor on top. There is moisture barrier under the subfloor. I am using Numax pneumatic nailer with 1-3/4" Porta-Nail cleats, 16 gauge.

When I test on scrap pieces, quite some nails (maybe 1/3 of them) are punching through the plywood! I can see the nails are not going 45 degrees but they are bend, that's why they punch through, if bend in downward direction.

So my questions are:
1) I suspect this brand is not that good (first time using it). Could you please recommend a good brand cleat? Is powernail a solid brand? Or Bostitch? Which one is the best? I cannot waste too much time on testing so I would prefer to get the best brand.

2) How about using 1-1/2" cleats? Any downside to using shorter cleats? This may be safer even if they bend they may not come out.

Thank you in advance!

Use 11/2" cleats.

every brand listed makes a quality fastener.

I would put Powernail at top , but probably all made in a factory in China anyway.

Thanks James.

I placed an online order for the powernail 1-3/4 because I cannot find it locally. It would take sometime to get here which I did not want to wait for but... Will see how these perform and use 1-1/2 as last resort.