
Distinguishing Bolts from Screws (2012) [pdf] - empath75
https://www.cbp.gov/sites/default/files/assets/documents/2016-Apr/icp013_3.pdf
======
imgabe
My first thought was "Are customs officers so stupid that they need to be told
this?". But then my second, more cynical though was "Someone, somewhere, will
question their methodology in distinguishing a bolt from a screw for some
obscure legal purpose (maybe to avoid a tariff on screws that doesn't apply to
bolts?) and they need this document to point to in order to explain in a
defensible way why they made that distinction".

~~~
HillRat
Evidently at least one lawsuit prompted the drafting of this semi-august
publication. Good government means, in part, consistent and reliable
application of rules -- even if it's as minute as the distinction between
bolts and screws!

This, in my mind, is a very particular example of the general case of good
government often being inefficient governance. We are protected against
tyranny, in an infinitesimal and indeed ridiculous way, by colorless
bureaucrats dedicated to the proposition that every bolt shall be labeled a
bolt, and each screw a screw, regardless of the power and wealth of those who
might carry them through customs and seek to see them mislabeled. Godspeed,
writers of CBP Informed Compliance Publication minutiae, godspeed.

~~~
mindslight
Consistent and reliable application of rules would _preclude_ creating
needlessly complex differentiations between two terms that basically refer to
the same thing.

The modern inability of an individual to independently and easily interpret
the law is _violation of equal protection_.

(IMHO the items described downthread by DannyBee sound like _the canonical_
thing most people picture when they hear "bolt")

~~~
imgabe
They don't "basically refer to the same thing". They are different items that
serve different purposes. They may _appear_ similar from a distance, but go
try to hang drywall with some machine bolts, then come back and tell me that
they're "basically the same thing".

~~~
mindslight
Your reasoning implies that one _can_ hang drywall with sheet metal screws,
simply by virtue of them being called screws.

~~~
imgabe
No, it doesn't imply that at all. How do you draw that inference?

~~~
mindslight
You implied that the reason one cannot hang drywall with machine bolts is
specifically because they're _bolts_. If being called bolts vs screws were
such a reliable indicator of functionality, then one would expect sheet metal
screws to be much better at hanging drywall than say flat head machine bolts.

BTW I personally call them machine screws. To me, the difference has more to
do with what kind of drive they take, whether they're self-tapping, how big
they are, or really just what kind of mood one is in.

I'm well aware of many types of threaded fasteners, which is what makes trying
for a general formal distinction between bolts and screws seem ridiculous. To
me, it seems like more a matter of personal taste and dialect, bureaucrats
attempting to force their prescriptions onto the world notwithstanding.

Any one definition can capture most of the distinction, but leaves a remainder
that's outright _wrong_. The CBP definition seems intuitively decent until you
realize that the same item will be a screw _or_ a bolt depending on the
_intent of the user_. That's exactly the kind of ambiguity that keeps lawyers
entrenched and erodes the rule of law.

If a welded nut breaks free, does its screw _become_ a bolt? When a nut gets
tight enough to not spin on its own, does a bolt change into a screw?

~~~
imgabe
Sheet metal screws _would_ be better than bolts at hanging drywall. They still
wouldn't be _good_ at it because that's not what they're for, but they at
least have a pointed tip that can dig into the drywall and penetrate it
compared to a bolt with a flat tip that is going nowhere without a pre-drilled
hole.

Personal taste and dialect are all well and good, but when Screwco sues the US
government to say they shouldn't have to pay the screw tariff, because they're
actually importing _bolts_ not screws, the government lawyer can't stand in
court and say "Well, your honor, we think it's our personal taste to call
these things screws and those things bolts because that's just what we think
and it's common sense, everyone knows it."

The government has a much stronger argument if they can say "See we published
this document which specifically defines what we consider a screw and what we
consider a bolt and as you can see this object has the physical
characteristics of what we call a screw, so Mr. Screwco does in fact have to
pay the screw tariff."

Personal taste is not generally a legally defensible position, which is what
I'm assuming the purpose of this document is, not a philosophical treatise on
the existential nature of screws vs. bolts.

~~~
mindslight
Actually I just walked over to my drawers and the first sheet metal screws I
found would be decent drywall screws (flat heads and everything), except for
the presumed increased cost. For machine bolts, I was picturing long 4-40
ones, hammered into the stud to get started. This seems like it would work as
well, just even less efficient cost wise for a longer body to compensate for
the shallower thread. But anyway back to the argument

There apparently _was_ this case:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12341278](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12341278)
. But the items described sound like _canonical_ bolts! Apparently the company
turning their head when installing them legally changes that. So now we've got
a legal definition that is abruptly different from how most anybody actually
skilled in the art would classify them if actually forced to choose
exclusively between the terms "screw" and "bolt".

My point is that perhaps if terms are so close to be generally interchangeable
in common usage, then perhaps the legal system _shouldn 't be trying to
differentiate between them at all_! It's a code smell of being at the limit of
understanding. The government should only be creating general rules that are
straightforwardly interpretable by the average person, not attempting to
catalog and dictate every minute domain aspect top-down.

------
alister
Traditional English usage adds to the confusion of bolt vs screw. Machine
screw and lag bolt are common words among technicians, carpenters, and
ordinary people, but each is actually the opposite of what the name suggest:

\- A "machine screw" is a bolt (i.e., it needs a nut):

[https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=machine+screw&tbm=isch](https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=machine+screw&tbm=isch)

\- A "lag bolt" is a screw (i.e., it doesn't take a nut):

[https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=lag+bolt&tbm=isch](https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=lag+bolt&tbm=isch)

~~~
JoeAltmaier
And a Square Knot is actually a bend. A knot is tied in the end of a rope; a
bend fastens two ropes together.

~~~
ruffel
Only if you're doing it wrong.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reef_knot#Misuse_as_a_bend](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reef_knot#Misuse_as_a_bend)

------
mattkrause
In the UK, there was a similar court case over whether Jaffa Cakes were
actually cakes or biscuits/cookies. The wikipedia page lists the 'factors'
that went into the decision:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaffa_Cakes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaffa_Cakes)

~~~
bigiain
The US "are tomatos fruits or vegetables" was always the "canonical example"
of the legal/tax system interpreting words with fixed technical meanings in
opposite but finacially-beneficial-to-the-government ways. (any botanist will
tell you a tomato is not a vegetable, and neither is a longbean... But we'll
tax them both as vegetables, not fruits ot legumes, "just because"...)

~~~
crististm
I remember quite recently what we've been taught at middle school: Fruits are
the product of a flower, period. Vegetables are plants cultivated for
consumption.

So yes, tomatoes are fruits but because they are cultivated they are also
vegetables. Some distinctions need to be applied as well (are apples only
fruits or vegetables as well?)

------
IANAD
Published July 2012. On October 18, 2013, Jeh Johnson took over, and he's made
a lot of progress. I recommend reading "Fifteen Years After 9/11, Is America
Any Safer?" by Steve Brill:

[http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/09/are-
we-a...](http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/09/are-we-any-
safer/492761/)

------
dugditches
Interesting. Basically if it needs a nut it's a bolt. But if it goes in(be it
drilling or an existing threaded hole) it's a screw.

I've never heard anyone use 'square headed screw' when referring to putting a
bolt into an existing threaded hole via socket/wrench.

And that typically the shape(no point, square head, tools used) define the
name.

~~~
TheLarch
I've never heard anyone call a lag bolt a screw, and yet they are pointed and
never mated to nuts.

~~~
tesseract
I see "lag screw" nearly exclusively in formal engineering or industrial
settings. "Lag bolt" seems more like a hardware-store colloquialism.

------
paulyg
Wecome to mechanical engineering folks.

~~~
samch
A mechanical engineering professor at our institution loves to ask the
uninitiated what the difference between the two is. His answer, "It's the
intent or purpose for which it's being used."

~~~
CamperBob2
From the linked document, it sounds like the key difference is whether it's
tightened by the head (screw) or by torquing down a nut (bolt). Seems like an
adequate definition, but then I don't work for the government, so I guess
somebody, somewhere, needs 17 more pages of guidance.

Parenthetically, if you want to get a Ronald Reagan elected over a Jimmy
Carter, this is how you get a Ronald Reagan elected over a Jimmy Carter. You
wave a document like this around in front of a TV camera.

~~~
TeMPOraL
> _Parenthetically, if you want to get a Ronald Reagan elected over a Jimmy
> Carter, this is how you get a Ronald Reagan elected over a Jimmy Carter. You
> wave a document like this around in front of a TV camera._

That this can work only makes me sad about the intelligence level and sanity
of the population. Documents like these don't get crafted because the
government has nothing better to do - it's usually a hotfix applied to a
hotfix. There's a law, then there's some "entrepreneur" who uses a
technicality to get around its spirit, and then the govt needs to patch the
exploit. Rinse, repeat. It's not difficult to understand, but sadly, I don't
expect most people to do so before outrage instinct kicks in.

~~~
CamperBob2
And yet it never occurs to those on the left to ask if the _real_ problem lies
in the underlying premise ("There's a law.")

------
tempodox
Wisdom to live by. Obviously, I was severely undereducated with regards to
bolts and screws.

------
walrus01
See also:

[https://www.amazon.com/Avoid-Huge-Ships-John-
Trimmer/dp/0870...](https://www.amazon.com/Avoid-Huge-Ships-John-
Trimmer/dp/0870334336)

------
cwilkes
Came here hoping to see some computer vision, leaving disappointed.

------
jostmey
At first I thought this title was a metaphor. Why should any customs agent
care about the difference between a bolt and a screw. Then I realized it was
literal.

Sad sad sad

~~~
JoBrad
There's an element of this that requires you to appreciate the fact that some
people spend their entire lives making bolts and screws, and using those items
to their fullest capacity. And minutia which may not be important to us will
be infinitely more important to them.

~~~
TeMPOraL
The world is full of recursive complexities. It's amazing, in its way. Pick
any thing you think you know something about and look at it carefully - you'll
always discover deeper and deeper levels of knowledge and specialization.

------
lancefisher
My guess is that writing this was punishment for mistaking a screw for a bolt
or vice-versa.

~~~
metaphor
Customs actually won both the original case[1] and subsequent appeal[2], which
leads me to suspect that the underlying motive is less punitive, more intern
busy work (annual reviews aside, revision history aligns well with ASME
B18.2.1 publication and its errata[3])...or maybe they've somehow justified
the effort as "amortizing" legal fees?

[1]
[http://www.cit.uscourts.gov/SlipOpinions/Slip_op00/00-112.pd...](http://www.cit.uscourts.gov/SlipOpinions/Slip_op00/00-112.pdf)
[2] [http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-federal-
circuit/1332533.html](http://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-federal-
circuit/1332533.html) [3] [https://www.document-
center.com/standards/show/ASME-B18.2.1/...](https://www.document-
center.com/standards/show/ASME-B18.2.1/history/)

------
foota
Can anyone tell the difference between primary criteria 5.3 & 5.4?

~~~
JoBrad
5.3 requires a nut, while 5.4 is screwed without a nut.

~~~
foota
I'm aware that's the actual difference, but couldn't you use the bolt without
a nut if the hole were preformed like for 5.4?

------
electic
tldr: STEEL SCREWS AND BOLTS are classified in Chapter 73, Harmonized Tariff
Schedule of the United States (HTSUS) under heading 7318. The tariff has
separate provisions for the different types of screws and bolts, and separate
provisions for threaded and non-threaded fasteners. The tariff pages covering
the various types of steel screws and bolts can be found by checking the
latest version of the HTSUS at www.usitc.gov.

------
quakeguy
Good introduction to bolts and shit....

------
NoGravitas
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