Supposedly, apparently, pros use metal pistol attachments for nozzle-less expansion foam canisters. Does anyone know why?
AFAICT, the pistols are a bit costly. The pistols themselves can get clogged and add a maintenance burden. You need to then buy a can of special cleaning solution (is it acetone?), to spray through the pistol after every use.
I have always used the foam for DiYers: a canister with a nozzle and long plastic straw. The straws are trivial to work with: you twist a screw into the end of the straw when done to seal it off. The stuff in the straw still dries out but it’s easily cleared by plunging it. A coat hanger can push it all out in one piece.
Twice those things have fucked me. I buy a huge can of the stuff and use it for one small squirt somewhere. Then the stuff cures inside the can near the outlet, thus sealing it off. There is no recourse because label even tells you that you’re going to get fucked. The label says “one time use”. Indeed, they expect you to blow the whole load in a single giant ejaculation. WTF? Now I have cans of barely used expansion foam with lots of liquid trapped inside the can. I don’t recall if I tried the spraying it upside down trick to clear the nozzle.
So I have to wonder, is the pro stuff any different? Wouldn’t the pro canister outlet self-seal just the same? A hardware store near me is going out of business and I have a chance to buy a pistol at ½ price. Not sure it’s worth it.
How does the nozzle not clog after you are done? Are you saying with the handle version you can screw on a can and use it every now and then?
If so that would be huge for me. As a home user I need spray foam once every few years and hate needing to buy a new can and throw out the half used old because it’s clogged.
I prevent it but spraying a bit of the acetone into the tip after use.
And the screw is on the Pistole (the wheel at the rear end, looks a bit different on mine than on OPs photo but same principle).
In theory the acetone is not even needed because it has a ball bearing tip that is airtight and that prevents the drying but I never tested the concept.
The foam gun seals at the very tip of the nozzle. Once you attach a foam bottle, the entire gun effectively becomes part of the pressurized bottle, and you can store it like that for months - but probably not years. However, if you set a reminder a couple times a year and spray some of the foam out from the gun to “freshen it up,” then it should stay in operating condition for the next time you need it.
That said, if you only need it once every few years, there’s probably no reason not to just buy a single-use bottle even if you don’t use all of it.