What do you guys do with this?

[lowell holmes]

I have a clear plastic shoe box with fasteners of all kinds, nails, screws , bolts . . . . . .

I will never to sort them and make use of them. There is no rust. I just can't bring my self to throw them away.

I bet I am the only one that does this.

[Ted Calver]

Well, having just spent the last half hour pawing through all three of my junk hardware boxes trying to find just the right size bolt to fix a broken solar spotlight fixture, all I can say is save the box. Found the bolt, fixed the light, put the boxes back in the attic, saved myself a trip to the hardware store.

[Paul Bent]

Those are called magic boxes for good reason. Everybody needs at least one. Saved my bacon more than once.

[Jim Koepke]

There are a few of those in my shop. They are almost sorted by type of hardware and sizes. For me running into town for a bolt is going to be at least over an hour round trip. It is easier to just try to keep a bunch of stuff around for the days it saves my bacon as Paul said. It has been well worth it if only for all the trips it has saved.

jtk

[Tom M King]

I have one large, shallow drawer, with a divider down the middle, and the tops of two toolboxes that are roughly holding different size ranges that have accumulated over 40 years. Even though I live way out in the country, a few years ago an Ace Hardware opened a few minutes away, and I can find exactly what I need, including the trip, in less time in their well organized fastener aisleway.

[glenn bradley]

I got one of the kids to sort them by general characteristics for a buck. Then I could quickly sort them into the Plano boxes I use to store such things.

[Paul F Franklin]

I too have such a box. I have it labeled "Hell Box". It has saved me a trip to the store more than a few times when I need one more of something, or something unusual that isn't in my usual stock. For the space it takes up, I don't mind keeping it around......

Brings to mind a (true) story. Years ago I worked for a smallish electronics company that designed and built custom electronic systems of all types. What you would call a "startup" today. The time came when we outgrew the space we rented so the owner bought the building across the street. Because of the nature of the business, we had 5 or 6 steel shelving units full of those cardboard bin boxes, all loaded with small hardware. #4, 6, 8, 10 pan head screws of all different lengths, washers, nuts, spacers...you get the picture. The crew was doing the move ourselves except for the large equipment like milling machines, etc. One of the guys had the idea to just wrap those shelves with plastic shrink wrap, like that used to secure boxes to pallets, and then move the shelves without unloading all the bins and wrapping them up individually somehow. Since the move was only a few thousand feet, it seemed a reasonable idea.

They got them wrapped and loaded into the uhaul without incident, and the driver drove very slowly to the new building. Of course, one wheel fell into a pothole and one of the shelves tipped enough against the straps for half of the hardware to dump. The owner ripped the guys a new one, but then wisely said to just throw it all out, figure out what was lost, and buy new. But the guy whose had the idea in the first place felt so bad that he loaded the mixed mess into a big box. He then spent any free time he had on the job sorting little hardware. I moved on after a few years, but for all I know he may still be sorting that box. I know he was still at it when I left....

[Joe A Faulkner]

There is a scrap yard in town that takes miscellaneous metals. For every pound I've scraped I probably have two in various containers in the shop.

[Bruce Haugen]

... It is easier to just try to keep a bunch of stuff around for the days it saves my bacon as Paul said. ...
[major snippage]
jtk

Many of the major things in life involve bacon.

[Rob Luter]

When I was growing up, my Dad had a wooden ammo crate from the Army that once held mortar fuses. It was full of a lifetime of spare and salvaged screws, nuts, bolts, and small hardware items. If you needed the odd part, it was in there. I use a different container, but it's the same concept. It's my "go to" for fasteners. I could organize it, but why?

[Bob Glenn]

Keep the box. You usually can't buy just one of anything anymore. Those fasteners are worth a fortune!

[Jim Koepke]

Many of the major things in life involve bacon.

And saving it!

jtk

[Jim Koepke]

My younger brother used to do a lot of salvage from businesses, kind of an off shoot from his dumpster diving. Occasionally he ended up with a few barrels of fasteners and other hardware. He would scoop them into baggies and sell them at swap meets and on ebay.

He didn't get rich, but he made money.

jtk

[lowell holmes]

You convinced me, I'm keeping it. I was anyway.

[Flamone LaChaud]

Being a PC tech for a number of years, I accumulated a stupid amount of tiny machine screws, along with other fasteners. Since my parents are of the age where their count of daily medicines nearly take up two hands . . . they are constantly needing to get rid of medicine bottles with those wonderful childproof tops. I've convinced them to collect the large bottles and give them to me, and have them labeled as to what is in them, and built a segmented box to hold 40 bottles (8x5). But I've also been eyeballing making one of the Underhill Nail Cabinets to hold fasteners that are too large for the typical medicine bottle.