5 ms·

The Price of Nails Since 1695: A Window into Economic Change

19 points by rustoo 5y ago

jaclaz 5y ago
As a side-side note, I find hypnotical to watch some manufacturing machines working: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5G9h-vCmE2U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5G9h-vCmE2U
- inglor_cz 5y ago
  This is an incredible video. Truly hypnotical.
  - jaclaz 5y ago
    Wait until you see this one making paper clips (JFYI), sorry for the OT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsDdmDFDYHA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsDdmDFDYHA
    - inglor_cz 5y ago
      Ah, Operation Paperclip, and in Germany of all places! (spoiler: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip)
    - derbOac 5y ago
      Better yet... https://www.decisionproblem.com/paperclips/ https://www.decisionproblem.com/paperclips/
      - mikewarot 5y ago
        I already did that one... 100 times!
- sokoloff 5y ago
  This one has some closer views of some of the forming operations: https://youtu.be/CUTTmtLKD2g https://youtu.be/CUTTmtLKD2g
- BrandoElFollito 5y ago
  It is a shame they spent do little time on the actual creation of the nail. In particular how the head is formed. I rewatched the sliw motiin a few times but still do not understand where the grid (or smooth surface) of the head comes from.
ctchocula 5y ago
The emphasis on nails is interesting, because of the similarity to pins from the famous anecdote about the incredible power of division of labour from "The Wealth of Nations" and how it can give someone a 4800x productivity boost making pins by each person working on a single part in the pin-making process vs. making each pin themselves: > To take an example, therefore, from a very trifling manufacture; but one in which the division of labour has been very often taken notice of, the trade of the pin-maker; a workman not educated to this business (which the division of labour has rendered a distinct trade), nor acquainted with the use of the machinery employed in it (to the invention of which the same division of labour has probably given occasion), could scarce, perhaps, with his utmost industry, make one pin in a day, and certainly could not make twenty. But in the way in which this business is now carried on, not only the whole work is a peculiar trade, but it is divided into a number of branches, of which the greater part are likewise peculiar trades. One man draws out the wire, another straights it, a third cuts it, a fourth points it, a fifth grinds it at the top for receiving the head; to make the head requires two or three distinct operations; to put it on, is a peculiar business, to whiten the pins is another; it is even a trade by itself to put them into the paper; and the important business of making a pin is, in this manner, divided into about eighteen distinct operations, which, in some manufactories, are all performed by distinct hands, though in others the same man will sometimes perform two or three of them. I have seen a small manufactory of this kind where ten men only were employed, and where some of them consequently performed two or three distinct operations. But though they were very poor, and therefore but indifferently accommodated with the necessary machinery, they could, when they exerted themselves, make among them about twelve pounds of pins in a day. There are in a pound upwards of four thousand pins of a middling size. Those ten persons, therefore, could make among them upwards of forty-eight thousand pins in a day. Each person, therefore, making a tenth part of forty-eight thousand pins, might be considered as making four thousand eight hundred pins in a day. But if they had all wrought separately and independently, and without any of them having been educated to this peculiar business, they certainly could not each of them have made twenty, perhaps not one pin in a day; that is certainly, not the two hundred and fortieth, perhaps not the four thousand eight hundredth part of what they are at present capable of performing, in consequence of a proper division and combination of their different operations.
- 5y ago
mikewarot 5y ago
I learned a week ago that traditional cut [rectangular] nails work far better than wire nails for many uses. The squared ends shear off grain and make it into a wedge locking the nails in place far better than wire nails with pointy tips that simply shove the grains aside, often causing the wood to split. Here's the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rwcGXIORro https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rwcGXIORro
- xref 5y ago
  Awesome vid, the visuals of driving in the nail to softwood are especially helpful. Had no idea cut nails were tested to grip about 1.5x better than wire nails, I thought they were mainly just about aesthetics
- kingcharles 5y ago
  That's some great information, thank you. I always assumed wire nails were better because they are more pointy and more modern.
- kwhitefoot 5y ago
  We still use cut nails in Norway.
- worthless-trash 5y ago
  This was exactly the topic I came here to talk about. These nails were primarily used in Australia till the 60's and then abruptly switched (for whatever reason). I can't tell if the study of the price of nails accurately compares the same nail type.
s5300 5y ago
I long ago read in a seemingly credible article, that for various reasons in olden times wooden houses would be burnt down as in the end they were just fairly worthless & abundant wood, & afterwards their nails would be collected because they were a valuable commodity. For reasons such as the house being old and decrepit, moving locations & rebuilding, financial reasons, etc. At the time I wondered if the heat would have an effect on the nails, but I think the answer is mostly no, it wouldn’t.
- Mountain_Skies 5y ago
  I remember reading the same thing when I was a child though it was only about settlers in North America burning down their homes to get the nails as they continued to push westward. Intentionally or not, it started my young mind thinking about relative values of objects instead of everything being set in a rigid system.
onion2k 5y ago
I had to mend a fence that was blown down in a storm just before Christmas, and needed some nails. I had to ask for help from an assistant in the hardware store just because there were so many different kinds. Nail manufacturers have not stopped innovating. I ended up buying "annular ring nails" that have ridges all the way down the shaft so they hold better. Holding bits of wood together is a weirdly interesting area of tech.
- pfdietz 5y ago
  HurriQuake nails got a lot of press back in the 2000s. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HurriQuake https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HurriQuake
  - ianbicking 5y ago
    Frustratingly that article says after introduction in ~2004, the nails were discontinued in 2011, but it doesn't say why. This Quora answer says more though: https://www.quora.com/Why-were-HurriQuake-nails-discontinued https://www.quora.com/Why-were-HurriQuake-nails-discontinued I guess the answer is that ring shank nails are less finicky and almost as good
egberts1 5y ago
Was half-heartedly expecting some factual basis or detailed charts containing detailed Laffer’s Curve or Regional Historical Pricings of a unit of nails. Got treated to yet another generalized opinion from an arm-chair economist.
jimmySixDOF 5y ago
Nails going back to 1600's ? Nice, but it's not the gold standard of comparisons that is the cost of lighting which has been tracked back over 3700 years from LEDs to Babylonians and sesame oil lamps. https://www.statista.com/chart/10567/the-cost-of-light-through-the-ages/ https://www.statista.com/chart/10567/the-cost-of-light-throu...
baremetal 5y ago
i use cut nails in homebuilding. For attaching pressure treated wood to the concrete footings when building pony walls.
h2odragon 5y ago
> Why nails? They are a basic manufactured product whose form and quality have changed relatively little over the last three centuries, yet the process for producing them has changed dramatically. I'm pretty sure the product has changed a lot, too. Iron "cut nails" used to be what a nail was; they're still available but we use a mild steel drawn wire thing now thats much softer and has a sharper point. We build with much softer wood than we used to, as well. and in smaller dimensions with different methods. Today's nail is a permanent fastener that bears load; used to be they were more of a "finish tack" and the joinery was done with pegs and tenons and glues and craft rather than the cehap, easy techniques we like now.

19 points by rustoo 5y ago

As a side-side note, I find hypnotical to watch some manufacturing machines working: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5G9h-vCmE2U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5G9h-vCmE2U

inglor_cz 5y ago
This is an incredible video. Truly hypnotical.
- jaclaz 5y ago
  Wait until you see this one making paper clips (JFYI), sorry for the OT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsDdmDFDYHA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsDdmDFDYHA
  - inglor_cz 5y ago
    Ah, Operation Paperclip, and in Germany of all places! (spoiler: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip)
  - derbOac 5y ago
    Better yet... https://www.decisionproblem.com/paperclips/ https://www.decisionproblem.com/paperclips/
    - mikewarot 5y ago
      I already did that one... 100 times!
sokoloff 5y ago
This one has some closer views of some of the forming operations: https://youtu.be/CUTTmtLKD2g https://youtu.be/CUTTmtLKD2g
BrandoElFollito 5y ago
It is a shame they spent do little time on the actual creation of the nail. In particular how the head is formed. I rewatched the sliw motiin a few times but still do not understand where the grid (or smooth surface) of the head comes from.

ctchocula 5y ago

The emphasis on nails is interesting, because of the similarity to pins from the famous anecdote about the incredible power of division of labour from "The Wealth of Nations" and how it can give someone a 4800x productivity boost making pins by each person working on a single part in the pin-making process vs. making each pin themselves: > To take an example, therefore, from a very trifling manufacture; but one in which the division of labour has been very often taken notice of, the trade of the pin-maker; a workman not educated to this business (which the division of labour has rendered a distinct trade), nor acquainted with the use of the machinery employed in it (to the invention of which the same division of labour has probably given occasion), could scarce, perhaps, with his utmost industry, make one pin in a day, and certainly could not make twenty. But in the way in which this business is now carried on, not only the whole work is a peculiar trade, but it is divided into a number of branches, of which the greater part are likewise peculiar trades. One man draws out the wire, another straights it, a third cuts it, a fourth points it, a fifth grinds it at the top for receiving the head; to make the head requires two or three distinct operations; to put it on, is a peculiar business, to whiten the pins is another; it is even a trade by itself to put them into the paper; and the important business of making a pin is, in this manner, divided into about eighteen distinct operations, which, in some manufactories, are all performed by distinct hands, though in others the same man will sometimes perform two or three of them. I have seen a small manufactory of this kind where ten men only were employed, and where some of them consequently performed two or three distinct operations. But though they were very poor, and therefore but indifferently accommodated with the necessary machinery, they could, when they exerted themselves, make among them about twelve pounds of pins in a day. There are in a pound upwards of four thousand pins of a middling size. Those ten persons, therefore, could make among them upwards of forty-eight thousand pins in a day. Each person, therefore, making a tenth part of forty-eight thousand pins, might be considered as making four thousand eight hundred pins in a day. But if they had all wrought separately and independently, and without any of them having been educated to this peculiar business, they certainly could not each of them have made twenty, perhaps not one pin in a day; that is certainly, not the two hundred and fortieth, perhaps not the four thousand eight hundredth part of what they are at present capable of performing, in consequence of a proper division and combination of their different operations.

5y ago

mikewarot 5y ago

I learned a week ago that traditional cut [rectangular] nails work far better than wire nails for many uses. The squared ends shear off grain and make it into a wedge locking the nails in place far better than wire nails with pointy tips that simply shove the grains aside, often causing the wood to split. Here's the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rwcGXIORro https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rwcGXIORro

xref 5y ago
Awesome vid, the visuals of driving in the nail to softwood are especially helpful. Had no idea cut nails were tested to grip about 1.5x better than wire nails, I thought they were mainly just about aesthetics
kingcharles 5y ago
That's some great information, thank you. I always assumed wire nails were better because they are more pointy and more modern.
kwhitefoot 5y ago
We still use cut nails in Norway.
worthless-trash 5y ago
This was exactly the topic I came here to talk about. These nails were primarily used in Australia till the 60's and then abruptly switched (for whatever reason). I can't tell if the study of the price of nails accurately compares the same nail type.

s5300 5y ago

I long ago read in a seemingly credible article, that for various reasons in olden times wooden houses would be burnt down as in the end they were just fairly worthless & abundant wood, & afterwards their nails would be collected because they were a valuable commodity. For reasons such as the house being old and decrepit, moving locations & rebuilding, financial reasons, etc. At the time I wondered if the heat would have an effect on the nails, but I think the answer is mostly no, it wouldn’t.

Mountain_Skies 5y ago
I remember reading the same thing when I was a child though it was only about settlers in North America burning down their homes to get the nails as they continued to push westward. Intentionally or not, it started my young mind thinking about relative values of objects instead of everything being set in a rigid system.

onion2k 5y ago

I had to mend a fence that was blown down in a storm just before Christmas, and needed some nails. I had to ask for help from an assistant in the hardware store just because there were so many different kinds. Nail manufacturers have not stopped innovating. I ended up buying "annular ring nails" that have ridges all the way down the shaft so they hold better. Holding bits of wood together is a weirdly interesting area of tech.

pfdietz 5y ago
HurriQuake nails got a lot of press back in the 2000s. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HurriQuake https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HurriQuake
- ianbicking 5y ago
  Frustratingly that article says after introduction in ~2004, the nails were discontinued in 2011, but it doesn't say why. This Quora answer says more though: https://www.quora.com/Why-were-HurriQuake-nails-discontinued https://www.quora.com/Why-were-HurriQuake-nails-discontinued I guess the answer is that ring shank nails are less finicky and almost as good

egberts1 5y ago

Was half-heartedly expecting some factual basis or detailed charts containing detailed Laffer’s Curve or Regional Historical Pricings of a unit of nails. Got treated to yet another generalized opinion from an arm-chair economist.

jimmySixDOF 5y ago

Nails going back to 1600's ? Nice, but it's not the gold standard of comparisons that is the cost of lighting which has been tracked back over 3700 years from LEDs to Babylonians and sesame oil lamps. https://www.statista.com/chart/10567/the-cost-of-light-through-the-ages/ https://www.statista.com/chart/10567/the-cost-of-light-throu...

baremetal 5y ago

i use cut nails in homebuilding. For attaching pressure treated wood to the concrete footings when building pony walls.

h2odragon 5y ago

> Why nails? They are a basic manufactured product whose form and quality have changed relatively little over the last three centuries, yet the process for producing them has changed dramatically. I'm pretty sure the product has changed a lot, too. Iron "cut nails" used to be what a nail was; they're still available but we use a mild steel drawn wire thing now thats much softer and has a sharper point. We build with much softer wood than we used to, as well. and in smaller dimensions with different methods. Today's nail is a permanent fastener that bears load; used to be they were more of a "finish tack" and the joinery was done with pegs and tenons and glues and craft rather than the cehap, easy techniques we like now.