The obligation to buy at the best price carries with it another, even heavier obligation-that of  verifying compliance with the specifications on your purchase order. Too often, when a technical product developed by a manufacturer is specified by your engineers- and then secondary vendors offer products which they claimed “equivalent”-there is a tendency to accept their claims at face value if the product is thought to be of minor importance. Nowhere is the danger greater than with fasteners. After all, how much difference can there be between one screw, one retainer ring, one self-clinching nut and another ?

The very term “nuts and bolts” connotes something cheap, common, ordinary, unimportant. Right? WRONG! A poorly manufactured self-clinching fastener bought on price alone can jeopardise the integrity of your product. Think of a self-clinching fastener as an integral component. If this component fails-if it threads improperly or breaks off-then no anchoring point exists for mounting other components and assemblies. The purchasing department saved a fraction of a cent on fasteners- and manufacturing division threw out dollars later.