Who hasn’t crossed paths with a stripped screw hole? You go to tighten the screw and it just turns in the hole but no righty tighty and maybe too much lefty loosey. A quick trick here is to fill the hole with a sliver or two of wood, plastic, matchsticks (minus the heads, so you don’t start a fire) , toothpicks, or even a rolled up bit of paper. This will give the screw something to bite on and help it to grab into the hole. You can either cut off or roll up appropriately guestimated sizes and amount of wood slivers or use rolled up paper and insert it into the hole then anchor your screw in the modified hole.
Now I wouldn’t recommend this repair for fixing planes, trains, or automobiles, but it works just fine on light duty applications such as cabinet pulls or interior door jambs. It can also work in some instances where the proper screw was lost you can use the wood and a smaller sized screw to anchor into the old hole. You may need to use a washer if your screw head is a different size. If you are concerned about longevity of the repair you might add a bit of wood glue to your inserted tree mixture and let it dry, if need be, and then screw in the screw.
Most screws are all about plane leverage. The screw threads grab into the material anchoring into the weaker spaces between material particles forcing the remaining weaker particles closer together thereby making them denser, more concentrated, and better to anchor to. The correct screw is particularly engineered at the proper angles and thread size for the material it is designed to anchor to for optimum holding power. Some materials including some types of wood need to be pre drilled to avoid splitting of the material.Each material is different in it’s density and tensile strength. Wooden matchsticks, toothpicks, and rolled up bits of strong paper are very flexible and still strong enough to fill voids, this is why they work well for this application, making them anchor into the existing subtances and create holding power.
This same effect works well in reverse the same plane leverage helps the screw to be easily turned out and removed for repairs or modifications. If you had to take apart something where this repair was done you may need to repeat the insert of some material if it had not been glued in.
~~~ Stay Strong ~~~
~~~ Kung Fu Maintenance ~~~~~~~
