Are there any brands of air tools that should be avoided or any that can be recommended?

Recommended - Ingersol Rand if you are using them professionally or have money to burn, Clarke if you use them rarely or are skint

Avoid - Snap-on, they are terrible quality, overpriced and have awful customer service. Bluepoint are no better and tend to be rebranded cheap stuff with a massive mark up

Lewis

that depends on which air tools they are imho.
their orbital sanders cant be beaten although they are on the tad expensive side, they are quiet and more powerful than all the rest i have tried.

I dont have money to burn, i'd rather spend it on the build although would like some good quality tools that wont break after first use so its swings and roundabouts!

Sorry, i should have been more clear - i was refering to the impact guns and airdrills, these are the only snap-on airtools i have direct experience of

Lewis

CP are good not the cheapest though - got all mine S/H but all work a treat

So are the clarke ones ok for the money, being at the cheaper end of the market i dont expect miracles but if they are ok...

See This Thread

It turns ot these are cp or if not a very very close copy!

If they are CP then they are only the really low-end CP stuff, like the the Clarke tools, they can be found under many diffrent brand names - I saw the impact gun from that set in Aldi for £8.99, in Machine Mart its £39.99 IIRC, I even remember seeing a BluePoint one in the past

I dobt they are actually CP - they are probably just turned out en masse in a factory in taiwan and then badged accordingly - it just so turns out that one of those many badges is CP to fill the cheaper end of the market

They are NOT badged cp, they are badged tooltec, however when compared side by side to a genuine cp version, there is no difference at all, the internals - well that could be another story! Although they both gave the same torque readings when I tested them. Yes you are right, it is label/badge engineering, but maybe, just maybe these are as good as their more expensive bretherin?

Yes thats what I meant, same tool - diffrent badges - some tooltec, some CP, some Clarke etc etc. I doubt the CP's have better/more expensive internals - I imagine they just charge more because people will pay more for a brand name

Any reccomendations on the actual compressor, i'm finding it hard to locate one that kicks out enough free-air CFM with a budget of £300 ish?

Well my personal experience with Clarke or SIP air tools is that they are useless cr@p and not worth wasting your money on. The SIP impact wrench I had wouldnt even undo car wheel nuts I had just torqued up by hand to 50ft/lbs! Stick with CP or Ingersoll Rand for top notch stuff. I've also been pleased with the Sealey air tools that I have. Cheaper end and seemingly good quality.

I've got a CP impact wrench, and a CP 3/8 ratchet. I've also got a 1/2 sealey ratchet and I can see no difference in performance between the CP and the Sealey ones.

I too have heard bad things about the Snap-on air tools.

I fancy one of those 1000 ft/lbs Ingersoll Rand ones!!!

Jon

i'm in the same boat at mo, just dont know which one to go for, some seem high capacity but low CFM.

Jon I take you mean the Ingersol Rand 2135 qti great tool but to get the power you need to run 130 to 150 psi and my hydrovane only makes 7 bar (105 psi) so I was a bit dissapointed in its outright power

I have quite a few Clarke tools - it is interesting that I have had different experiences with different tools. Their 1/4" air ratchet is fantastic - I wouldn't be without it. Their 1/4" impact gun is TERRIBLE - I never ever use it, and it couldn't stir porridge. I even sent it back to them, as I thought it was faulty. It came back well oiled, but with 'no fault found'. Now it is just taking up space on my garage wall.

^^^ he means half inch, I promise.

Yeah thats the one! Thats interesting to know though........think I'd better check what my compressor kicks out!
Thanks
Jon

Not sure what is the best but if you are looking at the tables in the machine mart catalogue.....watch out!
If it says 7cfm at 8bar it does not mean you will get 7cfm for a whole minute.
Look for something well over 3hp with a decent sized tank.

MM seem to quote max air displacement rather than the more useful free air CFM, another misleading bit of data!! Ho hum, i shall keep searching.

My compressor is a really old hydrovane (6.8cfm IIRC it's got a 1.5kw motor) it didn't like driving air tools so I put it onto a 50 litre tank, job done. The only thing that can suck the tank dry..... is my die grinder, after about 3 minutes the tank is down to about 80 lbs and I have to stop and wait a bit, everything else is fine.
I bought a cheap £30 1/2" impact gun,looks like a cheap cp gun but it wouldn't undo LandRover wheel nuts most times so I invested in an Ingersoll Rand 1/2" gun the difference is astounding, it's not been beat yet. Anyone want a little used cheap impact gun?

Shaun.

Just bought an Ingersoll-Rand 1/2" Ultra Duty Titanium Air Impact Wrench from USA with the exchange rate cheaper then here £145 delivered

arrived yesterday, wow what a difference from my 33year old snap on one

came with set of flip sockets gloves and muti tool in plastic carrying case.

Well please