This weekend I read a thread on the Practical Machinist forum asking what size hole to drill for a given diameter of spring pin (which we often call a roll pin). I never gave it much thought, but it turns out to be a pretty simple answer: drill the hole of the nominal size of the spring pin (and in many cases up to a few thousandths over), so for a 1/8″ spring pin, a 1/8″ diameter hole. I decided to poke around and of course Machinery’s Handbook has all the data for both slotted and spiral spring pins.

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You Toolmongers have been holding out on me. How come no one told me — or, perhaps worse, why didn’t I discover before — that there are simple formulas for determining the nominal diameters and clearance holes of (Unified Thread Standard) machine screw sizes 0–14*? All those years I spent looking up that little table, or trying to find that plastic gauge thingy…

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Lex’s recent post on captive nuts reminded me of some other nuts I’ve been using a lot lately while doing some volunteer work on a search-and-rescue van: nylon-insert hex nuts. Depending on which big box you shop at, and whom you ask when there, they’re also called stop nuts, locknuts, or nyloks (although NYLOK® is a nylon material typically applied to bolts and screws), or nylocks. I like them because they resist vibration and loosening, they’re reusable, they don’t damage threads, and they’re readily available. McMaster-Carr has a large variety in their catalog, and many of the big boxes carry Hillman versions.

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I’ve been a stapling fool the past few years, stapling everything from small animal fencing and shooting targets to home repair projects, using my standard array of manual staplers from major manufacturers. The problem is, as I get older, pulling the stapler trigger or handle gets rough on the old hands — so I’m taking a look at the Arrow CT50K battery-operated stapler.

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I don’t know how woodworkers do it. A good quality clamp will run you $30 to $60 per clamp — yet most committed woodworkers have a wall of 20 to 50+ clamps. That money would buy me the cabinet saw I’ve been looking at, and I feel lucky to own the half-dozen bar clamps that I do have. This R&R Stackable Clamp System at my local Woodworks caught my eye, and it looks like a good deal — but unfortunately it’s still out of my budget.

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Another cool idea from FastCap, the Blind Nail System allows you to hold stuff together without any visible fasteners.  They could replace a small clamp, holding small parts while the glue sets — all kinds of applications with molding and casework come to mind as well. Whatever you do with ‘em, you’re saving yourself work in the future by not having to fill nail holes or plug screw holes.

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I thought Velcro — or more generically, hook-and-loop fasteners — only came in adhesive-backed styles, but then I ran into these Velcro rolls at work, where we use ‘em for cable management.  The hooks are on one side of the roll and the loops are on the other.  I may be the last Toolmonger to come across these little round gems, but I thought I’d pass ‘em along just in case.

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If you’re looking for a new idea in fasteners, the UFO Ballistic NailScrew might be the newest show in town — you drive ‘em in with a nail gun, and if you ever want to remove ‘em, you can just unscrew ‘em.  Just to let you know:  My grandfather had this idea first.  Many times I and other family members witnessed him screwing a screw about halfway in and then beating it the rest of the way in with a hammer;  we should’ve contacted the patent people years ago.

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Simple hardware like the right-sized knobs can be difficult to find when you need them, and you can pay a whole lot more that you’d think proper once you do.  Snap-Lock knobs are a cheap and versatile solution.  They allow you to assemble your own custom knobs using the nut or bolt of your choice so you don’t have to keep a dozen different sizes on hand.

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If you’re tired of changing the bit between drilling the pilot hole and driving the fastener, you can avoid all that bit-swapping with the Jack Rabbit Deluxe Set.  I’ve wanted to check this out ever since I saw Norm using it on the New Yankee Workshop.  Sure, you could just use an extra drill or two, but some of us are limited on space and don’t like the clutter.

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This past summer I was hanging poultry wire for some poultry stables, and if I’d had the ThumbSaver I could’ve saved my thumb some pain and lowered my stress level by about 200 percent.  This is one of those products you look at and say, “I could’ve made that.”

A small groove with a magnet in it holds the fastener so you can hammer away, while keeping your thumb out of harm’s way. FW Tools currently packages a standard and a mini size ThumbSaver together for about $20.

ThumbSaver [FW Tools]
Street Pricing [Google]
Via Amazon [What’s This?]

If you want to stop machine noise from leaving your shop or prevent noise from entering your media room or bedroom, these simple and relatively inexpensive Isomax clips will help attenuate unwanted sounds, without taking up a lot of space.

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With this Craftsman Master Rethreader Set you can easily recondition those dirty, gummed, nicked, and just-plain-nasty old fasteners. The rethreader works slowly down the threads and cleans them, and it’ll also help correct those crossed threads, but it won’t cut new threads — you’ll need a regular cutting tap and die set for that.

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You might have some luck getting a corroded fastener unstuck by heating it, but you probably want to avoid soaking the fastener with penetrating oil or lubricant before applying a flame to it.  With Freeze & Release, you can do the same thing with cold — get a fastener cold fast enough and the bolt and nut should contract at different rates, hopefully freeing the fastener — plus there’s no problem using penetrating oil to speed the job.

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Inevitably there’s times in your shop that you need a few screws of a certain type, but in order to get them you have to buy a 1lb box — and you always wondered why the old man kept glass jars full of miscellaneous screws. Get a head start on a lifetime of collecting things in glass jars with McFeely’s 5 or 10lb boxes of assorted screws.

McFeely’s is liquidating tons of mixed fasteners left over from their packaging operation, and rather than throwing them out they’re putting them in boxes and shipping them to your doorstep.  There’s no guarantee that you’ll get any specific mix, but all of the leftovers are their top-quality screws, such as stainless screws, concrete screws, and plated screws of all varieties — some of which sell for more than $20/lb.

Get the 5lb box for $13 or the 10lb box for $25.  You pay around $8 shipping for the first box, and each additional box adds a few bucks.  Limited quantities are available — they’re only selling what’s on hand, not creating batches of mixed screws on purpose.

5lbs Mixed Screws [McFeely's]
10lbs Mixed Screws [McFeely's]

Starborn Industries, makers of the Smart-Bit, also put out some fasteners with innovative features — the most photogenic are their DeckFast epoxy-coated screws.

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Incorrect torque on a small screw may not lead to a life-ending event on the highway, but on precision machines and carefully calibrated devices, small screws require careful handling.  If you don’t care to keep up with the digital age, an “old-fashioned” torque driver will do — but if you’re interested in the tools of the new millennium, check out this digital torque driver.

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