Shopsmith Forums

Hi: I'm in the process of trying to re-hang the cabinet doors in our kitchen after having them refinished. The hinges are old and worn out, and are a model and style that is no longer manufactured. The doors overlay the cabinet fronts by 1-1/2 inches, and are only 1/2 inches thick. As a result, I can't use the newer European cabinet style hinges. I found some Rockler no mortise hinges that should work, but they only use a #4 screw. I'm having great difficulty getting the screws into the old hardwood doors without stripping the heads or breaking the screws off outright. I tried both phillips head and pozidrive screw bits. I tried increasing the pilot hole size to 5/64", but the screws still only go about half way in, whether I put them in by hand or with a power screwdriver. I'm afraid to use soap for fear that the small screws will back out. I did finally find a vendor with a no mortise hinge that accepts #6 screws, and try to find 1/2" #6 flat head screws to fit them, but that puts off the project completion even farther. Other than drilling out 1/4" holes and glueing in dowel ends to set the screws into, can anyone offer any hard-won experience on how to do this?

Thanks in advance.

First, I don't think using soap will have any effect on the screws backing out.

Second, if you are striping the heads or twisting off the screws you still don't have the pilot hole big enough. Using a larger screw will actually make the problem worse if you don't have a large enough pilot hole. The harder a wood the larger the pilot hole needs to be within reason.

You can also buy tapered bits specifically designed for drilling screw pilot holes. They drill a hole tapered to fit the taper of the screw shank. In your case I would use the #5 drill for your #4 screws.

Years ago I was asked to help a friend restore cabinets that were at the time 40-50 years old. The doors were made of knotty pine and due to their thickness which ate the point of the hinge attachment was pretty thin and the age and softness of the wood we could not get the screw to hold. Ultimately we used a post and screw fastener which resolved the issue. That was in the late seventies and they are still holding well. Here is a link for the fastener type. They are readily available in brass or steel. http://www.fastenercomponents.com/produ ... -1_13.html
Paul

The post and screw assembly makes wonderful sense, thank you very much. I did try larger pilot holes to no avail, and this approach gets around that problem. Here we go!

Putting screws in hardwood is really easy. First drill a pilot hole just a bit smaller than the threads of the screw. Then put beeswax on the threads and turn them in. It doesn't matter what size screws you use if you drill the correct size hole first.
I've installed hundreds of screws this way with no issues in Oak, Maple, Hickory, and Walnut.

garys wrote:Putting screws in hardwood is really easy. First drill a pilot hole just a bit smaller than the threads of the screw. Then put beeswax on the threads and turn them in. It doesn't matter what size screws you use if you drill the correct size hole first.
I've installed hundreds of screws this way with no issues in Oak, Maple, Hickory, and Walnut.

And how much of that(using brass screws with straight slots ) was 'old' and petrified?

garys wrote:Putting screws in hardwood is really easy. First drill a pilot hole just a bit smaller than the threads of the screw. Then put beeswax on the threads and turn them in. It doesn't matter what size screws you use if you drill the correct size hole first.
I've installed hundreds of screws this way with no issues in Oak, Maple, Hickory, and Walnut.

I'm not doubting you. But you have been very very fortunate. The quality of screws keeps going down and on some all you have to do it seems is look at them funny and they snap off. I have been ordering screws from Woodcraft for the last few years to get the quality screw I expect.

In my younger days I had a buddy that had tremendous fore arm strenght and he was always twisting the heads off things. He could even split straight slot screws with a mini screw driver. I could never figure out how it happened. But in the last few years I have broken more screw and bolt off than I ever did before. That is when I realized how really poor quality screws were being sold.

Shifted over to Highpoint screws from Woodcraft and I haven't stripped, twisted off or broken a screw since.

If you are using brass screws in hardwood you need to drill the pilot hole, then use a steel screw of the same size to 'tap' the hole and reduce the effort on the brass screws.

If you are installing in very soft wood, do the same but before installing the brass screw put a couple of drops of Super Glue in the hole. But be fairly quick with the brass screw.

And I, too, use beeswax instead of soap. Soap has water in it and I cringe at water in contact with wood (even though it is a very small amount ) for anything other than raising the grain during finishing.

Forrest

The whole point here is a pilot hole of the right size for the material and the screw. Hard vs soft wood, brass vs steel screw. There is no universal size pilot hole for a given screw size regardless of what the charts say. Every situation is different. Brass screws require a much larger pilot hole especially in hard wood. They are very soft.

Ed in Tampa wrote:

garys wrote:Putting screws in hardwood is really easy. First drill a pilot hole just a bit smaller than the threads of the screw. Then put beeswax on the threads and turn them in. It doesn't matter what size screws you use if you drill the correct size hole first.
I've installed hundreds of screws this way with no issues in Oak, Maple, Hickory, and Walnut.

I'm not doubting you. But you have been very very fortunate. The quality of screws keeps going down and on some all you have to do it seems is look at them funny and they snap off. I have been ordering screws from Woodcraft for the last few years to get the quality screw I expect.

In my younger days I had a buddy that had tremendous fore arm strenght and he was always twisting the heads off things. He could even split straight slot screws with a mini screw driver. I could never figure out how it happened. But in the last few years I have broken more screw and bolt off than I ever did before. That is when I realized how really poor quality screws were being sold.

Shifted over to Highpoint screws from Woodcraft and I haven't stripped, twisted off or broken a screw since.

I use screws from McFeely's. They are great quality at a good price. I don't know how they compare to Woodcraft.