{"id":7702,"date":"2014-10-28T01:12:14","date_gmt":"2014-10-28T05:12:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dougbittinger.com\/thoughts\/?p=7702"},"modified":"2025-04-21T01:56:39","modified_gmt":"2025-04-21T05:56:39","slug":"nails","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/nails\/","title":{"rendered":"All About Nails"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"square<\/a>Hand-forged nails were the first manufactured fasteners and they date back to Biblical times.\u00a0 As people first used hewn beams, timbers, planks, and whole logs to build with, the early hand-made versions were spikes.\u00a0 With the development of the split wood shingle, nails of about 1″ long came into use.\u00a0 When sawyers, and then sawmills, began cutting dimension lumber, the sizes and varieties greatly expanded.\u00a0 Thus, over time, nails developed in different sizes, shapes, and used different heads to fasten lumber and wood.<\/p>\n

These fasteners have always been in demand.\u00a0 Some blacksmiths made only nails and they were called “Nailers.” Nails were so scarce (and expensive) in pre-1850 America that people would burn dilapidated buildings just to sift the ashes for nails.[1] They did so because pulling the fasteners would have damaged most of them.\u00a0 After the nails were recovered, a blacksmith could easily straighten any nails that had been bent during construction.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/p>\n

We still use the term “penny” when referring to a nail’s size.\u00a0 It is believed that this term came into use in the early 1600’s in England.[2] The English monetary unit was the Pound Sterling (\u00a3) which was divided into Shillings and Pence.\u00a0 The cost of 100 nails in Pence in the 1600’s is how we refer to nail sizes to this day.\u00a0 For example, 100 small nails that sold for 4 pence were called 4d nails (4 d is the abbreviation of 4 pence).\u00a0 100 larger nails that sold for 16 pence are 16d nails.\u00a0 And so on.<\/p>\n

Setting the price of nails did not standardize their size.\u00a0 But it is apparent that the price of nails was constant, or near constant, for a long period of time, and thus, led to standard sizes as a result.\u00a0 For quite some time, nails have been sold by the pound–usually 1 lb. and 5 lb. boxes for small finishing and specialty nails and 50 lb. cartons for framing nails such as 8d and 16d.\u00a0 Nails are also sold by keg weight.<\/p>\n

The cut nail made its appearance in the mid-1700’s.\u00a0 For example, Thomas Jefferson established a nail factory at his Monticello plantation as a way to increase his farm income.\u00a0 His nail factory made both hand-forged and cut nails.\u00a0 It would not be until the middle-1800’s that cut nails began dominating the marketplace.\u00a0 Cut nails are not actually “cut”–they are sheared from steel plate that is the thickness of the nail shank.\u00a0 Although routinely referred to as “square nails”, the cutting machine tapers the nail shank as it is sheared from the steel plate.\u00a0 A second machine forms the head of a cut nail.\u00a0 The square nails in the above photograph are made in this manner.\u00a0 With the hand-forged nail, all four sides are tapered.\u00a0 With the cut nail, two sides are parallel because they represent the thickness of the plate they were sheared from.<\/p>\n

Cut nails could be manufactured much faster than hand-forged nails.\u00a0 As the process was mechanized, the cost per nail was less.\u00a0 However, cut nail factories employed operators and attendants for each machine so the process was still labor-intensive.\u00a0 The noise in those mills was deafening as well.\u00a0 Cut nails had their heyday from about 1820 (development of the Type B nail) to 1910, the advent of the wire nail.<\/p>\n

Wire nails are round.\u00a0 Steel wire is fed into a machine that grips the wire, cuts it, makes the head, and chisels the point, all in one operation.\u00a0 This process is totally mechanized, requiring only someone to turn the machine on and off.\u00a0 Wire nail machines can make thousands of nails per minute.<\/p>\n

Wire nails have all but replaced the cut nail.\u00a0 Cut nails are still used but mainly for restoration and masonry work.\u00a0 Though wire nails are cheaper to produce, the cut nail has a holding power of approximately four times to its modern, round cousin.\u00a0 Compared on that basis, cut nails win the day easily.<\/p>\n

In modern construction, more and more nail-driving is being done with air-operated nail guns.\u00a0 Nails of nearly all sizes are available.\u00a0 However, since the air nailing gun is large and cumbersome, it is most often used to fasten sheathing, such as plywood, to the framing.\u00a0 The nails are prepared to fit in the air gun’s clip or nail sleeve (much like a stapler and the way staples are loaded) and are driven one-at-a-time.\u00a0 The air gun nail resembles the cut nail of old with the exception that the head is “T”-shaped rather than battened on all four sides.<\/p>\n

\"Nail<\/a>“Dead as a Doornail” is a phrase that comes from the “dead nail”.\u00a0 A dead nail was one whose tip was clenched back into the wood.\u00a0 This was a common way to fasten door and gate hinges to prevent the nails from working loose.<\/p>\n

Info courtesy of Blacksmiths Guild of the Potomac newsletter.
\n.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hand-forged nails were the first manufactured fasteners and they date back to Biblical times.  As people first used hewn beams, timbers, planks, and whole logs to build with, the early hand-made versions were spikes.  With the development of the split wood shingle, nails of about 1″ long came into use.  When sawyers, and then sawmills, … Continue reading “All About Nails”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[71],"class_list":["post-7702","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-educational","tag-history"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7702","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7702"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7702\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19809,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7702\/revisions\/19809"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}