Older Hardware vs Newer Hardware .... Quality etc.

[Dave C]

Do all the Ace stores carry the same stuff?? I'm guessing probably not.

JL.............

There's an Ace store five minutes from me but they don't have near the stuff that the store in the next town has, and their prices are higher. The same family owns all the Ace stores in the metro Jackson area, but prices and inventory are not the same in all stores.

[JoeLee]

Here is another example of crappy hardware. Bought a bunch of 9/16" nuts from the local hardware store. The threads are horrible. The starting threads on most of them looked like the one in the picture. Stabbed my finger on one of them. Some had the hole noticeably off center and some had chunks missing out of the thread and almost looked like they were cross threaded.
I brought the bad ones back today. The girl said I could hand pick the ones that pass my inspection. I said, sorry for being a pain but I'm very particular about my nuts.

JL.....................

[nickel-city-fab]

That's just ..... unacceptable. That's horrible. You need to find a different place to shop, full stop.
I use and recommend either McMaster-Carr https://www.mcmaster.com/
and/or Hanes Supply https://www.hanessupply.com/

Here is another example of crappy hardware. Bought a bunch of 9/16" nuts from the local hardware store. The threads are horrible. The starting threads on most of them looked like the one in the picture. Stabbed my finger on one of them. Some had the hole noticeably off center and some had chunks missing out of the thread and almost looked like they were cross threaded.
I brought the bad ones back today. The girl said I could hand pick the ones that pass my inspection. I said, sorry for being a pain but I'm very particular about my nuts.

JL.....................

[JoeLee]

That's just ..... unacceptable. That's horrible. You need to find a different place to shop, full stop.
I use and recommend either McMaster-Carr https://www.mcmaster.com/
and/or Hanes Supply https://www.hanessupply.com/

Yes, it is unacceptable especially at today's prices. Up until the last couple years I never really paid much attention to stuff like this with hardware.
For me it started with button head screws. The ones I would buy locally were nice. Then they started coming through with YSF on the head and the head shape changes slightly. I remember they guy telling me the company was bought out by YSF, forgot who they are and that companies are stamping their initials on the heads due to all the counterfeit crap showing up.

After that I just started noticing a lot of imperfections in everything.
My local store does carry some good hardware. The grade 8 stuff looks OK, so far. They carry a lot of Brighton Best like in set screws and they look OK. SHCS stuff looks OK and all the real old hardware that they still have of course is really good.

Those nuts were just bulk bin stuff but even that stuff used to be good.

JL...............