Do you guys re-use old bolts?

PRIMER...certainly if the head is in good shape. the threads are good, and the bolt is streight. hell brother they cost a small fortune these day's...POP.

 

Sometimes.

 

I saved bolts and nuts since the early 60s. A few years ago I decided I was not going to live long enough to use them. I have parted out and scrapped a ton of cars. So I got an old Dodge maxivan, no engine or trans. I knocked the windows out, and started throwing cans of bolts and nuts into the van. Took me a week to clean things up. The tires were flat, checked them, they had 40 psi in them. Pumped them up to 80 psi, and winched it on to the trailer. At the scrap yard, the van weighed 12,000 lbs.

 

YES ... I do.

I worked in a salvage yard part-time for many years and the other workers used to laugh at me because at closing time, I would go and pick up the bolts and nuts I wanted off the floor ( if they had disassembled a GM or Ford ) before they swept everything in the trash.

I believe that the old 60's and 70's factory General Motors and Ford hardware is better than the new stuff you buy at Fastenal and other places ( especially the hardware store )

I have 4 apple boxes full of good old GM and Ford supplied hardware and I use it whenever I can. A lot of it is special hard to find stuff too.

 

i stash all of em but if if it needs new i get new ones get gr 8s and sand or machine the heads smooth and for engines internals ARPs are the way to go

 

New good stuff on critical components or follow 29nash's good advice. Just this morning had K-mac lower control arm cam & bolts installed. OEM originals (aussie '72 Falcon) are too thin in cam section & nuts are not deep enough for an effective re- torque- size matters with this particular Falcon set-up.
The OEM oldies were used at last suspension rebuild and were a constant pain in the arse. Front end had kicked out- Tyres quickly chewed out. K-mac replacements have much more meat everywhere. Feels like my sweet old car again.

 

I use em all...................just me though

 

I re-cycle them from work ......saves me a fortune



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I have to agree; one thing I hate about being a (relatively)young guy, I don't have a huge surplus of old nuts and bolts to rummage through like I had at dad's garage when I was a kid. I have some, but it seems I'm constantly running to the parts house for fasteners.

 

I really hate the look of the new stuff, and use it as little as possible.
I just donated some old aircraft fasteners to a race care restoration,
and they were very happy to get it, since that's what rodders and racers
used back in the day.

BTW, used bolts and studs should not have sharp threads - new bolts have
a tiny radius on the threads.
Clean them up, clean off your fingers, and run up and down the threads.
If they feel "sharp", toss them.

 

Hell yes I reuse bolts all the time.

 

Learned a hard lesson by re-using pressure plate bolts when I broke one torquing at 30 lbs.

I should have known better. HRP

 

in high stress areas, no, but even with low stress areas, I seem to torque the heads right off older bolts anyway(even after soaking with penetrating oils for several days), so it seems I replace them too.

 

I often replace bolts, but always keep the old stuff.
Never know when you are going to need a nut or bolt.

 

I save alot of old nuts and bolts. I blast & re-use if I can. Depending on the application, I like to use stainless hardware. Dont have to worry about rust.

Nothing beats Henry Steel in the end.

 

If it is something that has a a lot of stress I'll get new bolts, but for bolting on body panels I use used bolts all the time. When I scrap a car I'll strip off bolts and nuts and some wiring too along with all the bulbs.

 

Yes on non critical and no on critical, but a big tip is never throw away fastners untill a better replacement is installed and to always bag and mark where they came from on a restore and to note missing or oddities on such.

OT:
I work in a parts store where we make custom hoses and most of the fittings have plastic caps for thread protection during shipment and I keep those in coffee can as they are great when blasting or painting or deep storage of protecting threads on parts.

 

In the aircraft world we have a term...On Condition. The only hardware things we do not reuse....cotter pins, safety wire, lock tabs, gaskets...like that. Bolts? Nuts? Washers? Lots of good answers in the posts above.

 

Depending on the project etc, generally i use new gr8 & stainless nuts. I save all old fasteners if in good condition and have enough of a collection so that for a special project i can make period correct. As others have said, i reuse most body bolts after cleaning.
The real problem with all these fastenors is being able to store them in such a way as to be able to find them when you need them. Now that would make an interesting thread, getting people to show how they keep them.

 

Yes, for non-critical apps. I keep them in separate containers according to size and length so I can find them when I need them. If you can't find them they're no good to you.

 

I was just thinking about replacing the control arm bolts on my late 70's Oldsmobile front clip. Were would I get these? The old ones are REALLY worn in the middle. Just replaced the bushings...

 

I agree with every one above regarding critical stress applications. Always replace with new. But for sheet metal, interior, anything exposed i prefer the look of original. Strip it,wire wheel it,and re use it.

 

I recycle all chassis fasteners, as someone pointed out, on 'condition' of the fastener, with no doubt that they could be used repeatedly and would serve well forever as long as they are not damaged. I prefer the old over the new, forsake the idea of having 'new' simply for bling.

Motor bolts;
Clutch and flywheel mount bolts, if I could come to a reasonable conclusion that they new and torqued properly before I removed them, I might re-use those. Otherwise they go in the scrap. They are the most likely of all high stress bolts in a motor to fail. If a motor was known to have been de-tuned or had sudden stoppage, then all bolts in the rotating assembly are put in the scrap. If the motor has had no major failure, has just worn out, I normally re-use the rest of the bolts after thourough cleaning and inspection, to include measuring for indications of necking, stretching, and magnaflux for cracks.
If I know that a bolt has been overtorqued it goes in the scrap. In cases where a bolt is measured with a stretch gauge to determine final torque I only use them once.

 

I always replace a bolt that shows wear to a measurable degree.

 

I save;
Body hardware-Fender/Bumper/Hood/Trunk and SOME engine accessory bolts.
The old Exhaust Manifold bolts/studs get tossed when I replace them.
I only had to snap a stud off flush with the manifold once to learn that lesson.....
ALL trim screws/clips that I can find.

It's amazing how many "fall' into my pockets at Pick-N-Pull....

 

Absolutely...with the right application.

When doing any high end restoration work on early cars the hardware has to be correct! Early bolt heads are not only thicker (taller) than they are today but didn't have even remotely similar markings on the head (if any). Same goes with nuts, they were generally thicker than the modern equivalent. There are specialty places that make new nuts and bolts that are correct for early cars but they cost an arm and a leg...so yup, I'll re-use old nuts and bolts if they're in good shape.

 

Yes, I reuse everything I can. I agree on high stress applications ner stuff is the way to go but, why not reuse the old stuff when you can. I got a big HF tumbler at an auction for $10 a while back and it makes them look brand new.

 

Taking my front clip apart I ended up with a lot of rusted out or sheered off bolts. So rather than mixing new fasteners with old, I saved all the old ones, and just replaced everything with the same size new. Sometime I'm going to go up in my private junkyard and strip down a 55 ford that's scrap quality and get every nut and bolt I can get off of that and see if I can't get a set of used bolts to replace the rusted out ones and go back to some original stuff. Also enough to use on bracing i build for the fenders since I'm not running inner fenders yet.

 

If the bolts are not critical or hard to find, I just twist them in half. Saves time and and I like using new correct hardware.