• kersploosh@sh.itjust.works
      7·
      23 hours ago

      Six-lobe/Torx reigns supreme.

      Square/Robertson is only acceptable if you are Canadian.

      Everything else on the chart is mental illness.

      • AxExRx@lemmy.world
        2·
        16 hours ago

        Robertson is good for low torque applications (like the electrical conduit bodies I use at work that use a robertson with a slot to seal their lid)

        Not so much for higher torque applications, like wood screws.

        my 1860s house had a lot of work done in the 70s with square drive. A lot of them got stripped / cammed going in. Many of the others have rusted enough or the steel is too soft (since the house has settled a bit more theres more sheer weight on the screw) and are impossible to remove without stripping.

        A clear advantage to the Robertson, though, is when they strip, they leave a fairly deep round hole with little taper to the walls- i can often remove them with a screw extractor with little to no pre drilling.

        I think hex heads belong on the ‘good’ list too, especially at larger sizes for higher tork applications. (I use ground screws with 8 and sometimes 10 hex bolts that tighten onto 2" steel pipe, that wants 60-100 ft lbs of torque. Its pretty easy to get your whole body weight on them without stripping, or the tool slipping out, like happens when working with regular bolt heads.

    • AxExRx@lemmy.world
      2·
      16 hours ago

      Squares are a bit better now, with higher hardness steels and stainless steels. My house has a lot of work done with them in the 70s, and they tend to be already stripped, or rusted enough to strip the moment I try to remove them.

      Theyre still transferring nearly all the force on 4 small parts of the surface area (in the corners) that is pretty tangential to the rotation (meaning more of the energy is going into pushing the head into deforming, as opposed to turning the head. That plus the 90° corners the force is in make for easier stripping.

      Still way better than a standard taper sided Philips though. although rarely you come across a square sided Philips (so the hole is a cross with no taper to it) that are always easy to work with.