When is a screw not a screw?

Today we carry yesterday's torch; picking it up , when others have either passed, dropped or tossed it off. Knowing a little about screws I feel like the imperial system, for example, was rather buried off the coast of Scooby Town. I'm not sure if I'll ever fully understand it. The screw has been used in mass since Archimedes applied it to move water from one height to a higher one. Some historians think the first screw based tool was used in Assyria around 350 years before but who's heard of that?

There's all sorts of screws out there: from a screw to fix material to a screw to fix your Mrs. The form is like a 3D repeat of a circle, the greatest discovery to man and applied in countless physical applications for tools and concepts to explain science. It would screw my brain to try and quantify a screw's value. I do know that a rare screw is worth paying a hefty price for. You can get one in a shop, off the internet, behind a flat bed or even from an old bag. Ironically, what's having 10,000 nuts, if you haven't got the right screw? What lengths would you go to, to finish off the job and get the final fix?

In the fixings and fasteners world a screw isn't just a screw. It could be one of over 10 different imperial or metric, threaded screws. You might want one of 100's of different materials, lengths, diameters, forms, tips, and head types. Are there really 10 x 100 x 100 x 100 x 100 x 100 x 100 , or, 1.0000000000000 × 10¹³ different screws for you to choose and us to stock? That's 10'000'000'000'000' bad boys and even if I'm exaggerating, half that is still more than Queen's had handshakes. On top of that you might need a washer and a nut to name a few extras. Which ever way you look at it, something has got to hold it all together and there's a big, wild world out there.

So, a screw is never just a screw, there are all sorts of complications; details to consider, so choose wisely or you might just get screwed.

What about when a screw becomes a bolt? To be continued....