screws, yeah screws - 'specially the haids

rjj45

Guys, I built these little desktop speakers with a Gradient Audio 4 inch and a Neo3.
Everyday I look at them the the darn pan haids on the screws just chaps my, well you get the idea.
What choices do I have for a wood screw. I'd really like them to be low profile.

jhollander

Try #4s.  This is #6 on the tweeter and #4 on the midwoofer

Wolf

Try some Robertson head "trim screws". The heads are less than a quarter inch in diameter and are of the flush variety. They only stick up a little when installed. They only come in 1.5" length, and some have an unthreaded shank just below the head. Get ythe ones that don't have that for thinner baffles.

rjj45

Thanks Guys   - appreciate the posts.
The Robertson head trim screws look pretty good, thanks Wolf.
John, smaller size would not offend my eye so much, but to tell the truth, I just can't stand those
PE pan head screws on a finished build. Someone made the suggestion in a thread somewhere to 
look at gun blue to dye bright screws dark blue. That is probably what I"ll investigate.
Last choice (which I might do anyways) is to use the low profile socket heads and threaded inserts.
That's close the look I want anyways. Low profile.
Thanks again.

jhollander

PE doesn't sell #4s.   I've done flat head but didn't find any pictures

R-Carpenter

https://www.mcmaster.com/92220a205

You could use t-nuts or just tap the front panel if the material is rigid enough. Baltic Birch or polymer baffle holds the thread quite nicely.

rjj45

R-Carpenter said:

https://www.mcmaster.com/92220a205

You could use t-nuts or just tap the front panel if the material is rigid enough. Baltic Birch or polymer baffle holds the thread quite nicely.

Thanks yeah, I'm going to give those a try. I won't know until I use them. I pretty much standardized on baltic birch, but will probably use threaded inserts. 

jr@mac

Whatever you do, avoid the PE socket cap head black oxide "wood screws". The regular panheads are good, the rest are absolute shit.

Nicholas_23

jr@mac said:

Whatever you do, avoid the PE socket cap head black oxide "wood screws". The regular panheads are good, the rest are absolute shit.

Ask me how I know , the head on the socket cap screws seem to be made out of melted down soda cans. I wouldnt even give these away to someone.

rjj45

Nicholas_23 said:

jr@mac said:

Whatever you do, avoid the PE socket cap head black oxide "wood screws". The regular panheads are good, the rest are absolute shit.

Ask me how I know , the head on the socket cap screws seem to be made out of melted down soda cans. I wouldnt even give these away to someone.

agreed. non-standard metric socket size also, and non-deep threads. Losers in every way.

BobBarkto

Button head screws are lower profile than the standard round or pan head screws. The head is a little larger in diameter than the equivalent round/pan head but sit about half as much flatter. I like the appearance better. The socket head screws Roman linked to look better, too. I've used both and choose when I want subtle or pronounced. The pan heads always seem to look out of place.

McMaster carries them.

rjj45

BobBarkto said:

Button head screws are lower profile than the standard round or pan head screws. The head is a little larger in diameter than the equivalent round/pan head but sit about half as much flatter. I like the appearance better. The socket head screws Roman linked to look better, too. I've used both and choose when I want subtle or pronounced. The pan heads always seem to look out of place.

McMaster carries them.

It's a trip that you focused on oval head screws. The more that I browsed all sorts of screws, the more that I knew that oval heads were exactly what I wanted. I could only find oval head wood screws in stainless (bright chrome finish). I've bought some gun blue to try to turn them dark blue. If that doesn't work out, I'll manually apply satin black after install. Think this is what I think will "satisfy my eyes". https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B075DJQGWD/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

BobBarkto

Check to see if the bluing solution works on stainless, most don't. If you're not familiar, Brownells sells a lot of chemicals for coloring metals.

But you might just have to paint them.

Should look good tho.

Wolf

I was wondering the same thing...

PWRRYD

We plate and coat/bake a lot of fasteners for aerospace and the military.  Some very interesting looking fasteners to say the least.  I've always got my eyes open looking for some that would work for DIY speakers...  non thus far.

jr@mac

Coating sst can be very difficult. 

jr@mac

Why am I awake at 5:26AM talking about screws? 

PWRRYD

The only method that I know of for making stainless steel black, other than painting of course, is to first nickel strike it then plate it with zinc/black.  We do this but not very often.  This works for 18-8, 304, and 316 stainless steel alloys. 

rjj45

Ok, I'll plan on paint. That's what my Googling found anyways about SS and bluing. Guys want to use SS screws in guitar repair but didn't want a shiny screw ruining the visual esthetics. Answer: paint the head (haid!) or use other screws.