Do you clock or time your screws?

[Van Huskey]

Well do you? I am talking about visible screws, if they aren't visible and you still clock them you may need a 5150 timeout..

[Jim Sebring]

I do, but most readers don't have a clue about what we're talking about. Few have had the opportunity to look at the workmanship on a British carriage or fine double gun.

[David Kumm]

Do you mean turning them so the lines are all the same? I thought everyone did that. Dave

[Craig McCormick]

Every electrical cover plate my guys install must have the screw slots vertical.

AZCRAIG

[Van Huskey]

Do you mean turning them so the lines are all the same? I thought everyone did that. Dave

Yep, I left it vague for fun and to create a google based "learning opportunity".

I thought everyone did too, but was at a friends house admiring his newly finished Kernov cabinet when I noticed his screws were not clocked. I ribbed him about it because he is a far better craftsman than myself and about as OCD as woodworkers come. IMO metal workers are much more OCD. He then went into a 45 minute diatribe, which I enjoyed, making the argument that this fetish (as he called it) could negatively impact function in wood. Basically, you run the risk of leaving the screw over or under tensioned in order to fed the fetish. He made sence but I will still clock my screws until I have a door fall off...

[David Kumm]

Sorry i gave it away. Too dumb for subtle. The old Boesendoerfer "sp" pianos were not only clock screwed but when taken apart the screws were all numbered and always replaced in the same hole. That is really German. Dave

[Van Huskey]

No worries, I knew it would happen in the first couple of posts, and I was betting electrical plate and gun smithing would come up quickly too.

Funny about the pianos, back when I was shooting competatively I bought a HIGHLY customized target pistol second hand and it always bothered me the screws weren't clocked. I couldn't undertand it based on the quality fo the work. After a couple hundred thousand rounds I broke it completely down and I forgot to lay out the screws correctly, as I reassembled it I noticed a pair of screws that were clocked that hadn't been before, a little trial and error and I figured out they HAD been clocked by the smith but someone had torn it down and just put the screws back in willy nilly mixing up the threads they had been clocked to.

We have a German neighbor who is one of two metal workers in my hood, Klaus can over engineer and over craft anything! When I need something fast that works I go to my other neighbor, when I need something that will last until well into the next century and look like a work of art, I head the other direction to Klaus.

[Alan Lightstone]

Here's a clock (watch) where they are not clocked. And for $18K too.
hublot_1.jpg

[John Lanciani]

Always if they show, never if they don't.

[ian maybury]

Speaking as an engineer that's precisely the sort of stuff in woodworking that puts me off on occasion - along with the insistence in some quarters on doing things the supposedly 'traditional' way for its own sake. Worse still when it's deemed a mark of personal superiority!

ian

[Brian Tymchak]

Well, I already learned my one thing for the day. I've not heard the term "clocking" until this thread. But, any screw I did put in I naturally left in a vertical or horizontal orientation, whatever looked best, if it was easy to do. Reading the responses here though I got a sense that there was more to it and so, taking Van's advice, I googled it up and found an article on PWWs site by Chris Schwarz. I would never have considered altering the seat of the screw heads to align the slots.

Thanks for the WWing lesson!

[Stan Krupowies]

I always do it with cover plates but I never knew what it was called. I just attributed it to being anal. Most screws I use in wood are not visible but I do make sure handle and hinge screws are clocked.

[John A langley]

I have clocked screws from time to time. But I'm curious, do you clock your phillips head screws or your square head screws? I'm afraid I have to agree Ian feelings on this one.

[Phil Thien]

Clocked screws are often a little too tight, or a little too loose.

[Carl Babel]

Always. And so far, I haven't bought a Festool. But the moment they come out with a drill driver that can guarantee that all screws drilled then driven with it end up clocked, I will be standing in line with a fist full of dollars.