Nuts and Bolts--Does Everyone Save Them?

I looked around my garage last night and counted 37 containers of various description, of nuts, bolts, washers, clip, shims, knobs, screws, etc. I still have some of this valuable material left over from when I was a kid and my Dad and I worked on stuff together.

I've parted out several cars over the years and as I removed various parts I would just throw the fasteners in a box or can, knowing that I would need them some day.

I admit to being somewhat of a packrat, but I really enjoy saving a buck or two, or not having to make a trip to the hardware store just for a certain fastener or small part.

Is this simply part of being a hot rodder or am I alone in my compulsion?

Rockettruck

 

I still have the stock hood off my Accord project and the fenders from it. Hood from an old FJ40 Landcruiser. Nuts and bolts from any number of vehicles and projects I have had in the past that are long gone now.

Yeah I am a pack rat and my garage shows it

 

you bet!

in fact, after hunting all over hell trying to find some certain sized of inverted flare nuts, you know the adapter ones to go to the master cylinder, i've started to harvest such parts when i'm browsing the junkyard, brake fittings, body bolts, flanged bolts, body/suspension shims, you name it. just grab a few each time you're there, you won't even have to steal them, as long as you buy some real parts the yard ain't gonna care about a handful of hardware in the bottom of your toolbox.

the hard thing about amassing hardware, is making it useable, just not enough putzy days to get sorted through all those coffee cans of hardware. at least i'm not like my dad, he doesn't have coffee cans, he has a bunch of 5 gallon buckets of bolts

 

I used to be the same way. Saved everything for the day I knew I would need it. So about 4 years ago I was looking for a part I was sure I had saved specifically for this particular project. Couldn't find it! Still haven't ran across it, 4 years later! Figured if I couldn't find a part I had specifically saved, how did I expect to find something when I needed it that may or may not even be here?

Now I keep things like nuts and bolts but I sort through them and put them in the bolt bin with the correct size about once every couple months. I have a bin slot for clips and such that gets "thinned down" at least once a year. Figure if I haven't had a need for one in a year, I surely won't need 10 just like it next year. Started doing the same thing with everything else around here. Once a year everything gets "reviewed" and if there is not an upcoming use for it in the near future, its gone. I probably wouldn't be able to find it anyway.

Now, in a couple of years when I have to buy all that stuff that I have thrown away over the years, remind my how great I thought my system was, OK?
Gene

 

Yep. Just a half hour ago I used 2 x 5/16 x 1" grade 5 bolts off an old Holden motor (I know because of the paint on the heads) to bolt the oil pump into my nailhead. I really don't have enough of this stuff.

Pete

 

Not only do I save them, but I can spend hours just sorting them out with tweezers. Compulsive organizer?

 

Yea I got enough of the STUFF to last for years.. But SOME Day yea SOMEDAY I just might need one of them bolts..So thats what a Packrat is!!!!!!!

 

Given the quality of current manufacture hardware, I'm glad I saved what I did over the years. I have a lot more trust in the quality of 50 year old used parts than what the hardware store sells. Now if I could get it sorted ...

 

I bought about 30-40 little plastic $1.00 bins before I moved here to Germany.
Went through my whole bolt bin and shipped it all over here. Must have been a few hundred pound of nuts and bolts.
It is all going back with me when I leave.
I can't live without my bolt bin.

 

I'm moving three containers full-o-that here!

Ever tried to buy non-metric here?

Over the years somerone would come in the shop needing a part. Sometimes I could give him something I taken off and saved for free. A good feeling

 

I have a wooden cabinet full - my grandfather willed it to me! A guy has to collect that stuff to get anything built around here.
I live in a city of 80-90,000 people and since we got 2 super walmarts, a Home Depot and a Lowes EVERY hardware store in town has closed! Its a shame...
(I now go out of my way to buy at a small place in the next town. They have a superwalmart going in across the street though.)

 

I spent a couple of hours last night sorting stuff. I decided that when my little hardware cabinet tray got full of a certain size nut (or whatever), that would be enough...

Nope. I would fill a tray and then grab a Pillsbury icing container--you know--the round, white container with either a blue or white lid, and start putting stuff in those. And on it goes...

Rockettruck

 

I save them too because they are hard to find in this age of blister pack everything. Even so called auto parts stores don't have anything anymore. Went to the local NAPA (newer place) and they had hardly anything. Did get copper wa$hers for a master cylinder fitting but no bolts. Not to hi jack, but I know the three points on a bolt head designate a grade 5, but there is also AP in raised letters on the head. The bolts hold the lower A arms to the frame. What do those letters mean? Not too anxious to put Ace Hardware grade 5's on if it should be something else. Also, the nuts appear to be deeper (thicker) than normal.

 

My Dad always said...."If it still works, save it...you may need it someday". And I'll be damned if he wasn't right.

Matt

 

Yep, got baby food jars FULL and stuffed on little shelves between the studs in the walls above my workbench in my garage......and for some reason I get off on organizing them too.

 

I use 5 qt ice cream buckets to sort everything. I must have 60 of them in the garage. Some of them I should just toss out. How many folks need to keep 2 lbs of eyeglass or watch screws. Why do I have a bucket of loose ball bearings? I know I don't want to spill that one again.

 

When I went to look at my house in Rhode Island before buying it, the garage walls were covered with shelves loaded with glass jars full of old nuts and bolts and fasteners. The realtor said "oh, we will clean this all up and bring it to the dump..." LOL. I said "Just leave it right there, I'll take it with the house". (Also got two nice old coal stoves and about a ton of coal still in the coal bin in the basement). When I moved to Kansas I brought all those containers with me, and now I have even more from this place! I use old Hellman's mayo jars (plastic now) to hold stuff.

It is a great feeling to need a bolt or something for a little project, and knowing you have something that will work in that one jar, finding it and using it.

 

yep....I'm a factory nut & bolt kind of guy . Got many containers of bolts/nuts/retaining devices gathered over the years. Being a stubborn bastard, i will dig for 30 minutes for the correct fastner, rather than make the 5 minute trip to the local hardware store. Broke down & bought some grade 8 1/4 & 5/16 nuts, bolts & flat washers at a local NAPA. Handy to have the small stuff on a late night thrash

 

Yup.

Don't modern looking bolts look silly on old cars?

And who hasn't been bailed out by pulling some wierd widget out of the 'WTF-ever' box?

-bill

 

yes I do
I have it semi sorted
used old nuts and bolts go in a small Knack box,
about half the size of a foot locker,
and new extra go in a drawer in the roll away toolbox
plumbing, tubing, electrical all have their own drawers too

nothing, well almost nothing worse than holding up a job for want of a single bolt

 

the guy we got our house from cleaned construction and warehouses in his retirement. needless to say we had a two car garage and a tractor barn full of cans of nuts and bolts. after we sorted through the two garages we had an f-150 bed pilled full of crap to take to the scrapper. now i have a bin in my shop and half of the two car garage full. comes in handy when you need a nut or bolt and don't feel like going to the store only to find they don't have what you need. have a friend that everytime we go to the junkyard he picks up ever nut and bolt from the ground and hides it in his pocket. then he walks around paranoid they saw him and are going to charge him, still make fun of him.

 

I was looking for my old 1bbl carbs, and all I could find was one from a 39 plymouth....

I've been thinning out here too. But it's still neat when I run across a distinctive old bolt or something that I know is from some project I worked on 25 years ago....I get that old man nostalgia feeling!

 

i save up old clips and bolts as well as buy new ones on a regular basis.i KNOW i get it from my dad.he saves EVERYTHING he doesnt use just in case..when we purchased the 68 327 for my 54 the plastic plugs that took the place of the spark plugs popped out when we turned the engine over and he SAVED THOSE! i asked what for and he said "you never know!" which is the truth!we also saved the spring and bolts from an old intake (i believe it's the choke mechanism?) that we're probably never going to use as well as some old hoses that should be replaced but in case ya need em they're there!
creepy

 

I am in the middle of moving to my new house and shop, Last night I cleaned my bench drawer out to move the bench this weekend and it had a five gallon bucket and two antifreeze jugs full just in it.

 

Yeah,,,I have a couple of old Craftsman tool boxes full,,,,one with nuts ,,the other with bolts,,,,,when I need something I use the dump and dig method,,,,

I need to sort them,,,someday! HRP

 

I cleaned out some bolts and nuts here a while back. I loaded a 21 cu ft freezer into an old Dodge van, and filled it up. At the scrap yard, it weighed 11,000 lbs.

 

The Busch bros have buckets and buckets o' bolts! And yet whenever we need one for a project we still run to the hardware store, lol.

 

I've got bolts that my grandfather took off an old Star 4dr back when the car was about 5 years old (engine siezed). No need to discuss it further.

Frank

 

I have a red magic box (like a crate) full of old fasteners and odds n' in's. That box of crap has saved my bacon a number of times. I always get excited when I find a bolt jar or something at a garage sale to add to my box.



DuckusCrapus

 

I have so many containers of nuts and bolts its out of control! When I'm too lazy (most of the time) to go digging I run to the harbware store and just add to the problem. I even buy them at yard sales. Let's see, sorting all your nuts and bolts. Isn't that what retirement is for? One of the most indispensable tools in my garage is a plastic bin that I got at HF it has a spout in one corner for pouring all those assorted nuts etc. back into the pasta sauce jars. I once caught my wife just about to use it as a paint pan. SHE WILL NEVER DO THAT AGAIN! -stick