Nails vs Screws

Anyone who owns a hammer has at some point had to choose between a nail or screw. There are different reasons for preferring each, all of which have some validity:

Screws hold better; nails drive faster.

Screws hold better; nails are stronger.

Nails are cheaper; power screwdrivers are less expensive than nail guns for high-volume projects.

The real reasons for choosing one over the other are more complex than what's cheaper or what's handy. New metals and coatings for nails also help blur the lines in terms of which is stronger or makes a better connection.

The difference between nails and screws is that screws have more tensile strength, while nails have more shear strength. Imagine you've taken a screw and a nail and inserted each halfway into a board. Then try to pry each of them out. The screw will resist your efforts more than the nail will. But take the same nail and screw inserted into the same board and hit each of them hard from the side with a hammer. The screw will likely break while the nail will only bend.

What does this mean when choosing a nail or screw? In a situation where a force such as weight or gravity is going to be bearing down on your fastener, a screw will resist separation better than a nail will. If, on the other hand, your project will be subject to flexing or side-to-side motion, such as a deck or framing, a nail is a better choice because it's less likely to break.

Say you want to attach a piece of two-by-four to the garage wall so you can put hooks in it to hang tools. If you nailed the two-by-four to the studs, the weight hanging on the hooks would eventually pull the board away from the wall, so screws would be the better choice here. However, if you were attaching pieces of one-by-two to that same wall as framing for pegboard, you could nail the framing into the studs and then screw the pegboard through the frame into the studs. As the framing wouldn't be weight-bearing, nails would do the job. Similarly, if installing a shelf, you would attach the shelf supports to the wall with screws, but you could nail the shelf down into the supports for stability.

Keep in mind that for any major projects, building codes may specify which fasteners are required.

Stainless steel

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