Sparkingchip:



If you do an image search you will struggle to find a picture of a fitting that does not have the screws aligned, some stood to an attention, some horizontal and a surprising number around two o’clock, but still aligned.

It's a bit like those pictures of cars you see in sales brochures. The maker's logos on both wheels are always exactly the right way up. You would hardly ever see this in practice - even in a car showroom.

Colin Jenkins:

Hello Alex.

With all due respects, my view is the exact opposite to yours!  Slotted screws are all easy to deal with.  Get to the awkward inner recesses of a cupboard, roof space or an elevated light fitting only to find find oddball screw heads......b****cks!  Are they Phillips, Pozidriv or Torx?  It sometimes even needs a torch to identify what's lurking in there. The correct driver is vitally important.  Now we need a full suite of four different driver sets for no good reason.  Rant over!

Regards,

        Colin Jenkins.

         

 

I am in complete agreement with Colin. My tool belt with the essentials in it is too heavy to wear around my waist due to the number of different drivers in it. I do have a driver with a choice of insulated tips but the handle is large and uncomfortable despite my large hands. If I try to lighten the load the driver I have taken out is the one I find I need when I get to the top of the ladder or worse spent five minutes threading my way through roof trusses to a remote owner of an attic.

Don't get me started on the screws made of hardened cheese with malformed heads and threads.

The +/- heads are the worst, the proper driver cams out before the required torque, often destroying the head so I usually  use a straight blade driver. 

I never use the fitting screws  supplied with accessories as they usually made from soft cheese but unfortunately I do not have the same choice the it comes to the screws for making the connections.

And how do you work out what driver and of what size is required for that screw at the bottom of the narrow hole where the spider has been busy and there is years of accumulated dust in it and the accessory has been fitted so that you cannot get your head in a position to look down the hole. Aaggghhhh 


It was all so much easier when there were only slotted  screws :)


I nearly always align the slots on accessories to five past seven and while I have ADD I do not have OCD :) 

Alex Barrett:

My view is the exact opposite, trying not to chew up the head of a tiny slotted screw at the bottom of a dark hole with an ill-fitting driver. 

Don’t use an ill-fitting screwdriver, particularly one that has doubled up as a chisel.