Old Fastener Storage: Do you indulge or refrain?

I decided not to derail another thread on fasteners (And even get this one into the right forum...), and got to wondering how others managed the "collection". I'm doing pretty well, but am always interested in improving the situation.

Keeping old bolts is a family tradition around here, starting with glass peanut butter jars my dad had (replaced with a coffee can or three after about the third one broke...) Remember seeing jar lids screwed to the underside of a shelf, and the jar, screwed on? Then some smart boy took a 2x2 and made a horizontal "rotary screw organizer" and probably retired soon after...

I finally got sick of having to dump out the can of nuts, bolts and washers onto the garage floor, and had my mom start bringing home coffee cans from work. that and a couple of milk crates and I dumped out the two of three cans I had and the wood box, and spent some time sorting the damn things out into fraction sizes, then into the coarse and fine thread fasteners. each can got filled with ONE size and this was a huge improvement!

Years later I bought a floor chest "tool box" that was an old navy thing from either a hospital ship or from an infirmary. I took most of one side and put the bolts so each drawer has a size, with fine on one side and coarse on the other. Nuts and washers went into one of those larger Accro bins with plastic drawers. later I picked up a "Pick-A-Nut" rack at a yard sale (All mixed up of course) and I sorted them out and properly racked them. I restocked out of my "supply" and it all worked well. the plastic bin setup a year ago got replaced with a metal box with aluminum "Accro" like bins which are larger and much more durable...

I recently rearranged in the garage, and got them all together, and more recently (last week) added a shelf on top for my wall mount bins. After the first rearrangement, my Son christened the area "Dad's Hardware store", and he's not far off. With a couple of roller acquisitions and more reorganization that floor chest lost almost every tool it had, and got re-purposed to bulk fasteners, nails, pipe fittings, you name it, with a little room to spare on top of everything else!


So this is where I am, Screws, nuts, Bolts washers, nails plumbing paint... it's all easy to get to now, and in one place.

The floor chest is part way through it's second refurb. When I first got it, I painted it "tool gray". a couple of years ago I was between jobs and had some hammer tone gray, and some black lacquer, and started wire wheeling it clean, and doing it up right. I had to stop when the hammer tone paint ran out (I would not justify ANY extra curricular spending..) and got frustrated with the drawer fronts, as for some reason they keep wanting to leave orange peel spots like there are spots of oil or wax on the surface...
I'll get back to it someday, maybe this winter...

The clutter on top includes my heated ultrasonic cleaner ($5 at a yard sale...) and my 120V spot welder, ($20 IIR)

EDIT: I forgot to mention, the red tray standing on end and leaning against the Ultrasonic cleaner, is my meager metric fastener selection. I just recently moved into that larger tray from a smaller clear plastic version.




The Pick-A-Nut selector. It has 1/4, 5/16, and 3/8 fine and coarse nuts,bolts and washers, and a bunch of other common automotive fasteners for battery clamps license plates, and even Zerk fittings. Above it is the "Paint department" mostly spray paint but some glues as well.



And the large "Accro" bin. Mostly numbered screws from #2 to #10, and the flat and lock washers, and nuts larger than 3/8, plus nylock nuts of all sizes, as well as other odd bits and pieces.




So, what do the rest of you do? I know at least a few of you also collect old fasteners for future use...

I seperate most hardware 5/8" down to 1/4" in army surplus ammo cans. They come in various sizes,they're sturdy,modular and have handles. You have to dump e'm some times to find the right one but easy to scrape back in. Smaller stuff goes in to organizer cases with clear tops from the depot.

Outlawmws said:

.... my heated ultrasonic cleaner ($5 at a yard sale...) and my 120V spot welder, ($20 IIR)....

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Nice finds.

I keep hunting for an ultrasonic cleaner. The only one I've seen was very large and the guy wanted $1K ! The search continues!

elevator joe said:

I seperate most hardware 5/8" down to 1/4" in army surplus ammo cans. They come in various sizes,they're sturdy,modular and have handles. You have to dump e'm some times to find the right one but easy to scrape back in. Smaller stuff goes in to organizer cases with clear tops from the depot.

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Surplus ammo cans are great for this, and don't waste space like coffee cans do, but they are getting pricey these days...

OutlawMWS, you are a sick man, and I am jealous of both your collection and your organization. I too keep fasteners I remove and replace, planning to wire-wheel and catalog them some day. Thus far, I just have lots of bins and tubs of rusty, dirty, greasy fasteners, waiting to be cleaned, scrubbed, and sorted.

I have piles of bolts, nuts, washers and much more that are not separated. How would you guys go about separating and sizing them?

I bought one of those HF black 4 drawer cabinets with the top that opens for $99. Put dividers in some of the drawers. Now all the SAE bolts are in easy to see order according to size with their lock washers, washers and nuts, after 50 years finally got it the way I wanted it. Going to buy another one for my metric collection. I use to do it with the pick-a-nut boxes, but now buy what I need in bulk and just drop them in the appropriate drawer.

My Dad used to save old fasteners, but very little organization. This pickle jar had wood screws, that coffee can had machine screws, etc. I disliked having to sort through the pile dumped on the bench and trying to find 3 or 4 screws that matched.

I'm just the opposite. I buy new. But if I need 3 or 4, I might buy the 10 or 20 pack. A couple of years ago, there was a guy on eBay who was offering free shipping on orders of fasteners over $50. I am now well stocked on fine and coarse nuts, washers and lock washer from 1/4 to 1/2 !

I also love having a REAL fastener store about 20 minutes from my house. If they don't have it, IT DOESN'T EXIST !!

ncautoshop said:

I have piles of bolts, nuts, washers and much more that are not separated. How would you guys go about separating and sizing them?

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Start with one of these and go from there....
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0040CZ6BM/?tag=atomicindus08-20

Nice collection Outlaw!!!!!!!! Nothing wrong with having the right hardware to finish a project vs having to go to town for one dam bolt!!!!!

Steevo said:

OutlawMWS, you are a sick man

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Steevo said:

I too keep fasteners I remove and replace, planning to wire-wheel and catalog them some day. Thus far, I just have lots of bins and tubs of rusty, dirty, greasy fasteners, waiting to be cleaned, scrubbed, and sorted.

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I finally learned the dirty fasteners are a headache, and ran them all though my parts washer in batches. These days I buy simple green in gallon jugs and soak them in that full strength. The rust can wait but the oil and grease have to go!

Get or make a wire mesh basket (You can see the one I made for the ultrasonic cleaner next to it) and you can do a double handful in a paint can, and pull them out and hose them off. 90% or more of the grease will be gone, and if you go after the last with a stiff nylon bush right away, they will be 99% clean. (dish washing rubber gloves help keep your hands from drying out...)

Lastly get a hold of a castoff toaster oven, and make/get a tray and spread them out and the heat will dry them fast. (If I can ever get the space, I'm installing a cast off full size wall oven in the garage for this and weld prep/paint prep/baking duty...)

This can all be done as fill in work for those times you are "waiting for the paint to dry"...)

ncautoshop said:

I have piles of bolts, nuts, washers and much more that are not separated. How would you guys go about separating and sizing them?

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Use the sizer that was mentioned until your eye gets trained to spot them at a glance. (Unless you have mixed in metric.. that is a pain...)


Get an open bench (Don't try this on the kitchen table unless you are single or want to be...) or large, edged cookie sheet, and dump them out and dig in. Have a row of containers to toss them in as you go. It really goes fast once you get going.

The only sorting job that took some time was when I got a couple of 5 gallon buckets full of mostly new/once used numbered screws,nuts and washers, electrical crimp connectors, and smaller socket bolts, (along with a smattering of this and that...) and my 5 year old son and I worked our way through them slowly but surely.

I filled FOUR of those 10X7 Plano organizer boxes with electrical crimp connectors alone. Needless to say I don't need to buy them often.

The machine screws are in that aluminum Accro bin set, and the socket head screws and bolts are in one of two 16 bin boxes I have that used to have Weatherhead hose connectors in them.

Oh yes, those buckets also had all sorts of EMT conduit connectors and fittings in them and those are in another set of larger stacking bins that are about 5x7x10 or so. (another shelf elsewhere in the garage)

I've got about 50 glass jars waiting to be filled. Must get a garage first!

LOL you guys are maniacs! Love the organization!

You're better organized than me. I have 5 gallon bucket of fasteners, wait what a great job for my daughters.

A friend scraped a 4'x4'x4' container of fasteners, you can't save them all.

-Plano boxes with all kinds of fasteners on shelves and in my toolbox
-Plastic cabinet with drawers holds heat shrink, resistors, switches, etc.
-Another cabinet with drawers holds audio connectors, voice and data jacks, assorted small parts
-More Plano boxes, but they have handles, with the stuff I most commonly use on installs/service work
-Servalite cabinet with trays (from the hardware store) that holds key blanks

I restore old farm tractors, and if restored correctly, have the proper bolt head markings. Therefore, I save every nut and bolt that is savable during a tear down. I also buy buckets, cans, and boxes of fasteners at farm auctions. I usually clean each fastener on a wire buffer, run a die over the bolt threads, or a tap in the nuts, lightly oil them, and put them in a "lazy Susan" bolt bin that I bought from an old supply house.

Yeah, it's pretty ****. But I usually clean bolts during "waiting periods" when I'm waiting for paint to dry, or oil to drain, etc. If I spend a few minutes each day, then a 5 gallon bucket of fasteners will be clean and organized in about a month without it becoming a chore.

The best part is that when I need fasteners, I can find them quickly and they're ready to go without cleaning or worrying if the threads are in good shape.

Dale

I have the palstic drawers for the small and medium stuff kept by size. Larger stuff in coffee cans.

I also save fasteners from anything I disassemble, if they are good condition. For me it is both a money (small reason) and timesaving (primary reason) effort. I live about 8 miles from any hardware store and hate to stop in middle of a project to run get fasteners. If I have a known project I will buy the needed fasteners ahead of time if I can.

Aberdale said:

I restore old farm tractors, and if restored correctly, have the proper bolt head markings. Therefore, I save every nut and bolt that is savable during a tear down.
Dale

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I do the same thing, but I keep the factory hardware for old Chevys. Most of the old stuff can't be replaced with exactly the same hardware anymore, so my stash comes in handy all the time.

Old generic hardware goes in the trash, and I buy new from the hardware stores. I can't see spending my valuable time cleaning up rusty hardware when the same stuff is still available new.

I made some drawers out of 1x pine with a thin plywood bottom, and used cutoff half-gallon juice jugs for the organizers.


Sized the drawers to fit 12 of the jugs. Then reused a cabinet frame I had by making some drawer "slides" out of angle iron.

Have the pic-a-nut cabinet ,Plano boxes, the plastic draw cabinets and coffee cans

glad to see all you hardware nuts!

bazzateer said:

I've got about 50 glass jars waiting to be filled. Must get a garage first!

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My Dad used those. I hated them. Too many got broken and picking the nuts and bolts out of pieces if glass is not fun.

With 2 granddaughters, I will have a never ending supply of plastic peanut butter jars in no time (they are only 2, but PBJ is one of their favorite things !)

man, i'm envious of you guys... i don't have much of a collection of nuts and bolts right now. i've been watching CL lately for a good supply

theoldwizard1 said:

SNIP
With 2 granddaughters, I will have a never ending supply of plastic peanut butter jars in no time (they are only 2, but PBJ is one of their favorite things !)

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I used those for years for bigger fittings; Where I still use them, I have switched to the squarish plastic jars from nuts and candy as sold at Costco in "bulk" as less space is wasted. You can see what's inside, which is way better than coffee cans, and no glass...

gsport said:

man, i'm envious of you guys... i don't have much of a collection of nuts and bolts right now. i've been watching CL lately for a good supply

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Many of mine are take offs, although I have quite a few new as well. before I throw most anything away, it gets disassembled, and of course, anytime I get parts from a wrecking yard, I take the fasteners whether I need them or not...

Mattlt said:

I made some drawers out of 1x pine with a thin plywood bottom, and used cutoff half-gallon juice jugs for the organizers.


Sized the drawers to fit 12 of the jugs. Then reused a cabinet frame I had by making some drawer "slides" out of angle iron.

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That is a nice approach. I see some possibilities here...

Gary S said:

SNIP
Old generic hardware goes in the trash, and I buy new from the hardware stores. I can't see spending my valuable time cleaning up rusty hardware when the same stuff is still available new.

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Certainly I have thrown out my share of fasteners past their useful life, but cost in $$ is not why i store so much old stuff. It is the cost of my time to go get new stuff.

Almost all "new" acquisitions get tossed into a big plastic jar on my work bench. When it is full, I have the option of starting a new one or dumping them out into a tray and sorting/stocking them.

Anything buggered up (that I missed originally), gets tossed, and anything dirty gets either a simple green soak, or ultrasonically cleaned, or both. I let the simple green do most of the work...

My future plan is to have one jar setup with simple green and a wire basket, and anything greasy/oily get tossed in right off the bat. when full, clean and sort. clean(er) stuff will still be treated as I do now.

38Chevy454 said:

SNIP I live about 8 miles from any hardware store and hate to stop in middle of a project to run get fasteners. If I have a known project I will buy the needed fasteners ahead of time if I can.

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I'm a lot closer to hardware stores, but the time to get there and back is still time consuming, and worst of all, the closest (OSH; being swiftly destroyed by Sears Holding...), has dumped the decent quality hardware for the crappy import racks of ****. So its either the big box home improvement stores (mixed bag at best) or the two local (but not terribly convenient) Ace hardware stores still plugging away. (I try to steer as much business their way as I can...)

930dreamer said:

You're better organized than me. I have 5 gallon bucket of fasteners, wait what a great job for my daughters.

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930dreamer said:

A friend scraped a 4'x4'x4' container of fasteners, you can't save them all.

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No you cant. When I got the couple of buckets of "stuff" some years back, the guy had several 55 gallon barrels of the stuff, and many 5 gallon buckets of it, as well as several doors with boards nailed on the edges with thousands of the fasteners and parts spread out so he could find what he wanted. if he couldn't find something, another bucket would get dumped out. Too much like needle in a haystack for me...

I got the stuff because he was moving and about to dump it all...

I'm guilty. I have the 2x4 with baby-food jar lids screwed in underneath it with all types of assortments. Mine are screw/nail/bolt/nuts/washers/combos (bolts where I have a matching nut already) sorted by length (as that seems to be what I'm most likely searching for). Now stuff is going in small coffee/tea tins and margarine tubs - stuff that I want to see goes in peanut butter (plastic) "jars" which I intend to use to replace all the baby-food & pickle (glass) jars. I've also done this for things like electrical wing-nuts, slipsleeves, drawer pulls/handles, about anything I may need one or two of again in the future.

My collection is small but has saved me more time than it has cost to keep it (in driving to stores that are normally closed while I'm working).

Outlawmws, what a great idea for a thread! We've all have that experience of a simple project turning into a pain-in-the-**** marathon simply because we can't find the correct hardware to finish the damn thing. Your solutions are a hell of a lot better than baby food jars and tin cans, and the cursed grab-bag boxes of 'miscellaneous'. I need to source a proper cabinet to steal your method!

"replaced with a metal box with aluminum "Accro" like bins which are larger and much more durable..." Any idea where these were made, or their original use? I'd truly like to track down something as durable and useful as those you found. Do you ever use the ultrasonic cleaner for hardware rejuvenation? I've never used one, but is it something you wish you owned all along? Thanks for taking the time to share your methods.

Nothing fancy here....somebody gave me a cpl Durham dwr bxs out of a service van.I added a new bolt bin to that.

Got an interesting storage "thing" years ago.It was a sheet metal mech personal stash bxs.They're maybe 16" square 2 or so inches deep.Segmented into 3x3 sections.All done with simple bending techniques and can't remember how they're fastened?Will try posting a pic of it.....cause they're pretty efficient in design/effort.

Our pro-bolt jobber has gone to putting sm quant of fasteners in clear zip seal baggy's,w/printed sticker.Size vary's according to quantity.Anyhow,usually get more than necessary and just toss whole bag in appropriate drwr.

We do alot of work on go-fast Japanese RR bikes......we have to stock metric and sae.Would say we're probably about 85-90% as efficient as we could be in fastener/parts organization.Ya'll have some nice storage units.BW

Omphaloskeptic said:

Outlawmws, what a great idea for a thread! SNIP
"replaced with a metal box with aluminum "Accro" like bins which are larger and much more durable..." Any idea where these were made, or their original use? I'd truly like to track down something as durable and useful as those you found. Do you ever use the ultrasonic cleaner for hardware rejuvenation? I've never used one, but is it something you wish you owned all along? Thanks for taking the time to share your methods.

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Thanks, it's definitely progress from what I had previously; especially now that it is mostly in one place. What is especially nice is the speed of getting a needed fastener, which at this point hardly slows a project, and I can be under a car and send one of my kids to get something with an expectation of them actually coming back with the right part...

The Alum "Accro" Box is I think an oldie, possibly 50's? No clue as to Mfg. or actual age. I cleaned up the box, fixed some dings and kinks, painted, and had the kids help me clean each individual tray with SOS pads. A couple of trays still have some remnant rust stains, so at some point it was outside... I can't recall seeing one exactly like it, other than ones with the plastic bins, so it may be somewhat of an orphan. If I saw another, I'd definitely try to get it, as I would the Pic-A Nut selector, if only to get some replacement boxes.

I think someone makes one with "soft" plastic trays, which would be much preferable to the hard plastic versions usually seen. The other possibility is the Plano covered tray, and stack/rack them, which I do for all the Electrical crimp connectors, and the various types of "speed screws", that I don't have/use in bulk like I do for sheet rock screws and long deck screws (3-5 lb boxes of these...).

The Ultrasonic cleaner is a more recent addition, and while it does a great job, essentially for nooks and cranny's, It was a chance find. I'm also pretty happy with just full strength simple green and long soaks. Both processes require some finish work to get the parts/fasteners to a final state of usefulness. I would not say it's worth a lot of $$ to go get one, but since I just about stole it (They set the price), I wasn't going to say no...

BWS: Definitely would like to see pics of your setups. Same goes for some of the other solutions mentioned by others!

I believe I have the exact same "Acro bin cabinet" that you have. I am using mine for tap and die storage. Last picture in post #1. Love your storage ideas for hardware storage. I too save all hardware I can and try to sort it out. I am not as efficient as you are yet.

I am another one of the fastener guys. I used to dismantle my junk cars before sending them to the scrapyard. I still have buckets of hardware from taking apart small block chevy engines. I am in process of cleaning up my mess. I will try and post a few pics of what I use. Outlamws where did you get the aluminum bin storage setup? It is one of the coolest things I have seen in a while.

Strouty said:

SNIP Outlamws where did you get the aluminum bin storage setup? It is one of the coolest things I have seen in a while.

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It was a yard sale find about a year or so ago. Paid more than I ordinarily would since it was so large (How often do you find one with 64 bins, much less aluminum bins...) and had such "cool" potential.

Great yard sale score, any manufacturer info or do you think it was a custom job?

I use a lot of plastic pnut butter jars. I sized my shelves made from recycled plywood to fit two sizes of the jars. The 18 oz and the next larger size. The big one on the shelf and the 18oz on top of that. Or two of the larger sizes stacked.
Harbor pfeight has a sorter tray for small stuff. Its like a 12 inch square baking pan about 3/4 in deep with a corner that is shaped for sliding the pieces back in the container.
It even has a loop on on end to hang it on the wall. It's cheap too.

Nick

nickleone said:

I use a lot of plastic pnut butter jars. I sized my shelves made from recycled plywood to fit two sizes of the jars. The 18 oz and the next larger size. The big one on the shelf and the 18oz on top of that. Or two of the larger sizes stacked.
Harbor pfeight has a sorter tray for small stuff. Its like a 12 inch square baking pan about 3/4 in deep with a corner that is shaped for sliding the pieces back in the container.
It even has a loop on on end to hang it on the wall. It's cheap too.

Nick

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And last I checked it is made in the USA!

Strouty said:

Great yard sale score, any manufacturer info or do you think it was a custom job?

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It's not custom, that is certain, definitely factory made, and drawn one piece aluminum bins . I'd hazard a guess at Accro, as the bins are nearly identical in size, other than the aluminum bins are a little taller. the plastic bins fit perfectly width and length. ihredo4 mentioned they have one also.