Leon wrote:
"Doug Miller" wrote in message
...
In article , SMS
wrote:
Jon Danniken wrote:

Be careful what you build with the fasteners you buy from the bulk
bin at
Home Depot.

Okay, then it's not just me that has that problem with lag bolts
from Home Depot. I've become anal about drilling pilot holes that
are long enough and large enough diameter to deal with these crappy
lag bolts.

Where can you buy good quality lag bolts though?

Any real hardware store.


I keep seeing this answer.... what does that mean exactly? Not
piling on you but what exactly defines a "real" hardware store, and
does that guarantee that the "real" hardware store will also not have
crap?

MeFeeleys is generally considered a reputable source for fasteners, I
agree for wood screws and graded nuts and bolts however I have bought
some pretty cheesy ungraded machine screws from McFeeleys, I have
had several break from 100 pack box.

I also agree that the big box chains are probably not the best source
for screws but if you buy name brand screws from those stores you are
going to get better quality. While I steer away from prepackaged
plastic bags of screws from those type stores I have never had a
problem with larger bolts and lag screws providing they had proper
sized pilot screws.

"Real hardware store" is too fuzzy a concept to be useful. OLD hardware
store would be a better bet--one that has been around since before HD--at
least that's a well defined term. OTOH, does Rocky's Ace, founded 1926,
really stock better fasteners than HD? They do stock a wider range of
specialty fasteners, that I'll grant them, but are their packaged fasteners
really any better?

Most localities in the US have within reasonable driving distance a
Fastenal. In any metropolitan area there should be a section in the Yellow
Pages for "fasteners" or "screws" or "bolts". Near the water in any city
with a harbor there will be marine hardware places that have a good stock of
corrosion resistant fasteners--alas the packages come with a picture of a
boat on them so they'll cost twice as much as the same fastener without the
picture of a boat. Near any major airport there will be an aircraft
hardware place--they'll have fasteners made to military specification that
are very high quality, but they won't be cheap.