• Hi Guest!
    You can help ensure that British Car Forum (BCF) continues to provide a great place to engage in the British car hobby! If you find BCF a beneficial community, please consider supporting our efforts with a subscription.

    There are some perks with a member upgrade!
    **Upgrade Now**
    (PS: Subscribers don't see this gawd-aweful banner
Tips
Tips

Phillips screws

feh... minutes late.

What THEY said. /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/jester.gif
 
Intresting articles. I diden't know when it was introduced, but I did know thet it was designed to be self centering for industrial automization.
That's one of the distinguishing marks of difference between handbuilt cars and mass produced "machine" built cars in the early days of automation.
Slotted screws weren't effective in powered drivers and slowed down the workers.
anywhere you see slotted screws, they were put in by hand.
 
One Good Turn A Natural History of the Screwdriver and the Screw by Witold Rybczynski- everything your ever wanted to know (and more) about screws and....

A interesting and even amusing read....
 
Does it mention the "Robertson" screw?
Which by the way is the best general purpose screw head every made....
I actually have to go into Canada to buy them, they are a square design, using a square headed screw driver.

Just my 2 cents....
 
svtmikey said:
Does it mention the "Robertson" screw?
Which by the way is the best general purpose screw head every made....
I actually have to go into Canada to buy them, they are a square design, using a square headed screw driver.

Just my 2 cents....
yea .... the cotton pickers are all over my Motorhome. They hold everything together ... well mostly everything.
Frustrating to say the least when I discovered I didnt have a dirver to take them out or tighten them up!
Once I acquired the proper driver for them .... they are dandy!

Better even than phillips or torx
 
MMC has em too.
 
For me, it's easy since I'm so close to Canada I go there for Pizza.
I was wondering why they haven't caught on in the US, but after checking out the two sites maybe I was wrong.

Both of them are now in my favourites (notice the Canadian spelling of favorite).

Thanks
 
svtmikey said:
For me, it's easy since I'm so close to Canada I go there for Pizza.
I was wondering why they haven't caught on in the US,

you probably know this but the reason they haven't caught on is because Robertson wouldn't license his products - see below. As well, Henry Ford wanted to buy the rights outright which Robertson refused to do

"Robertson had licensed the screw in England, but the party with which he was dealing intentionally drove the company into bankruptcy and purchased the rights from the trustee, thus circumventing Robertson.He spent a small fortune buying back the rights. After that, he refused to ever allow anyone to make the screws under license. When Henry Ford tried out the Robertson screws he found they saved considerable time in the production of cars but when Robertson refused to license the screws to Ford, he realized that the use of the screws would not be guaranteed and stopped using them." (Wikipedia)

BTW we're close enough to the USA to go for Barbeque :smile:
 
Ok...

I've got a question...

Do any LBC's have Phillips screws before 1960?

I have a few on the Elva & I've always suspected that they are not original.
 
WhatsThatNoise said:
Do any LBC's have Phillips screws before 1960?
Probably not really what you want to know, but my 56 and 58 TR3s have a very few original Phillips screws on them. For example, the screws that hold the pole pieces to the generator housing; and the screws that hold the point plate to the distributor body. The 58 also has them holding the grille to the body. Not absolutely certain, but I believe the original screws for the headlight trim rings and retaining rings were phillips head.

However, the parts catalog describes them as "cross head", so perhaps they are not true Phillips heads.
 
Good call...

Forgot about the dynamo screws.

(I think mine has Phillips screws holding down the plate on my DM-2 dizzy also)

And the headlights...

I honestly couldn't think of any that I was sure of were original.
(except maybe the ones holding the drums on???)
 
Back
Top