Squaring Round Nails
Posted 11 March 2015
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Do you ever wish you had some square cut nails for a project but find the price prohibitively expensive? Paul shows how you can take regular round nails and make them square using a couple of hammers.
A good option to have when in a bind, but that would be torture to have to create many like that. And of course they don’t have the wedging action of real cut nails.
Fortunately cut nails are still being made, and there are a lot of sellers on EBay too.
I love any trick of the trade – and the look that gives is an option for any project I think, not just a period reproduction. Thanks.
Thanks for this usefull tip!
The magic of common sense. Thank you again.
Here is a source for all sizes of ‘cut nails’ in the US : http://www.tremontnail.com/
Yes, you can buy cut nails — the problem is they are prohibitively expensive. And somehow I always manage to get the wrong sizes. Being able to ‘square’ my nails from what I have on hand — to get the square nail look will be a great tool in my toolbox of ideas.
Thank you for this link! Tremont Nail company is 20 min from my house, no less. I have been making my own “cut nails’ via Paul with great results for cabinet work.
Dear Mr. Sellers. Thank you.
Did this at the weekend for some beading I made for a newel post at the bottom of our stairs. Was very handy because I could sink the nail heads down easily (they were flat round heads before).
Paul,
Thank you for this video. I am working on a project that needed old-style square nails. I have commercially available 1 inch old-style nails, as some of the others have commented. Most of my project used the 1 inch length. Nevertheless, I needed 4 nails an inch and a half long. Rather than ordering a pound of these and waiting, I hammered out 4 bespoke nails I needed to complete my project. As someone else posted, we can always benefit from learning a new technique.