You can make your own concrete fastener for horizontal applications by using a small bolt or piece of threaded rod embedded in mortar, epoxy repair mortar, or the specialized epoxies used for embedding rebar. Drill a hole twice the diameter of the threaded rod or bolt. You can either place the fastener in the hole and then push the filling material in around it or with thinner materials, fill the hole to the halfway point and then push in the fastener. Be sure to turn the fastener back and forth to ensure that it is locked into the embedding material. Also, use a square from two directions to check that the fastener is square or plumb to the surface.

Hammer set anchors are simple fasteners that fit through a hole in whatever you are fatsening, such as a shelf cleat, bracket or other piece of hardware. Their dome-shaped head bears down on the surface of the workpiece. Slip the fasteners through the wokrpiece, into the hole in the concrete and then drive the nail in them until it is fully seated against the dome-shaped head. These fasteners work best when used in applications where one is enough to attach the load. Using more than one on at a time requires careful drilling to ensure that the fasteners line up both with the holes in the mounted object and in the concrete.

Amateurs and professionals alike often forget that safety and drilling a high-quality hole go hand-in-hand when fastening to concrete.

Some heavy-duty plastic anchors, such as the Red Head Polyset, can be driven into a hole in concrete. From there, you use the included pan head sheet metal screw to fasten whatever you need.

This tool makes short work of punching a reliable hole in concrete, mortar, brick, Portland cement plaster (stucco), and even many types of stone. Once you have that hole–properly known as a pilot hole– you can drive a masonry screw or bolt into it, or you can install a soft sleeve into which you can drive a wood screw or sheet metal screw. It’s that easy.

Lag shields are hollow soft metal sleeves that are driven into a hole. When a screw or bolt is driven into the cavity in the center of the sleeve, the fastener’s threads cut into its wall, which is softer than the steel screw or bolt.

Many cordless drills today are equipped with a hammer function. I’ve talked to people who didn’t even know this was included on their drill. Compared to a cordless drill without this feature, it’s a slight upcharge–about $20, on average. A hammer function provides a percussive action to chip away and pulverize masonry as a masonry bit spins. To help these specialized drill bits withstand such harsh use, they have a piece of carbide brazed to their tip. Carbide is not a single material, but a mixture of them. It starts out as carbide powder intermixed with a metal powder, such as tungsten. The powders are mixed with a binder additive, formed into a shape, machined, and then fused together at high temperature forming a composite. The carbide tip is brazed onto the body of the drill bit producing a device that is both flexible and wear resistant, yet has an extremely hard tip. Drill a hole with that bit, then drive a hardened masonry screw into it.

The fastest way to drive a masonry screw is with the same drill driver that made the hole. Turn the drill’s selector to the drive setting, turn the clutch to the maximum number, and use a nut driver or drive bit to sock down the screw.

Many people struggle with fastening to concrete–and other masonry surfaces, such as brick and concrete block. Turns out, there’s nothing to it. The best way to fasten to it, especially for DIYers, is to just dill a hole and drive a screw.

Tapcon’s massive concrete screw can be used for heavy-duty applications, such as fastening posts to a concrete slab.

Next, wear a dust mask. Pulverizing conctete with a drill bit creates dust, and some of that dust becomes airborne while drilling and, later, when you clean out the hole.

You can do lots. You can use this tech to drill in mines or drill in concrete. Its cool that the tech goes back far enough that it was mentioned as a great thing back in the 1960’s/70’s when Monty Python was doing its show. Tungnsten carbide drilling and cutting is a wonderful thing. It makes many modern construction techniques possible, and makes this factory a real place of wonders. There’s plenty to do here. Need to ancher that gunsafe to the concrete floor. Tungsten carbide drill bits (along with a hammer drill) are there to make it work. Same goes if you want to run a wire through a concrete/brick wall or precut a crack in floor concrete so it doesn’t crack the wrong way. I was merely bringing up that that crazy band of mostly Brits back in the 60’s got it right in acknowledging the significance of this technology. :-)

Why use the sun when you can make your own? Someday. I really want to see a future with fusion deep-space propulsion, hopefully I’m still alive.

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For anyone into machining, the video below is a must see. For those not in the know, tungsten carbide inserts are the replaceable bits that form the cutting edges of almost every tool used to shape metal. The video shows how powdered tungsten carbide is mixed with other materials and pressed into complex shapes by a metal injection molding process, similar to the one used to make gears that we described recently. The inserts are then sintered in a furnace to bind the metal particles together into a cohesive, strong part. After exhaustive quality inspections, the inserts are ground to their final shape before being shipped. It’s fascinating stuff.

This is actually due to how these materials are made, which is slow and uses a HUGE amount of energy. They are crystals that are grown in laboratory environments by exposing a source material to very high temperatures for an extended duration. If we could harness the power of the sun more efficiently then these materials would be cheap.

When the hole is established, you can move the hardware or lumber out of the way and continue boring to the hole’s full depth. When drilling mounting holes in long pieces of wood or metal, drill one mounting hole, then drive a screw at that point. Level the workpiece, drill a second hole, and drive a second mounting screw. With the workpiece fastened at two points, and level, drill remaining mounting holes and drive the remaining screws.

The job’s bad reputation was well earned but is out of date. Years ago, fastening to concrete was difficult and hit or miss. If you’ve ever tried driving hardened-steel nails into concrete or tried to make anchor sleeve holes with a wobbly rental masonry drill and a dull rental drill bit than you know about frustration.

Mum: How are you liking it down the mine, Ken? Ken: Oh it’s not too bad, mum… we’re using some new tungsten carbide drills for the preliminary coal-face scouring operations. Mum: Oh that sounds nice, dear… Dad: Tungsten carbide drills! What the bloody hell’s tungsten carbide drills? Ken: It’s something they use in coal-mining, father. Dad: (mimicking) ‘It’s something they use in coal-mining, father’. You’re all bloody fancy talk since you left London.

Yea, big diamonds are relatively useless compared to the absolutly essential bits of diamond found in these cutting inserts.

A simple dust mask works well enough to protect you from airborne cement dust created when you drill into concrete and when you remove it.

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“The degree to which the plant is automated is staggering – from autonomous forklifts to massive CNC work cells that require no operators, this looks like the very picture of the factory of the future.”

Roy Berendsohn has worked for more than 25 years at Popular Mechanics, where he has written on carpentry, masonry, painting, plumbing, electrical, woodworking, blacksmithing, welding, lawn care, chainsaw use, and outdoor power equipment. When he’s not working on his own house, he volunteers with Sovereign Grace Church doing home repair for families in rural, suburban and urban locations throughout central and southern New Jersey.

The thing that changed all that is the ordinary cordless drill. More specifically, the cordless drill with a hammer function.

It seems a touch ironic that one of the main consumables in the machining industry is made out of one of the hardest, toughest substances there is. But such is the case for tungsten carbide inserts, the flecks of material that form the business end of most of the tools used to shape metal. And thanks to one of the biggest suppliers of inserts, Sweden’s Sandvik Coromant, we get this fascinating peek at how they’re manufactured.

Coincidentally, [John] at NYC CNC just released his own video from his recent jealousy-inducing tour of the Sandvik factory. That video is also well worth watching, especially if you even have a passing interest in automation. The degree to which the plant is automated is staggering – from autonomous forklifts to massive CNC work cells that require no operators, this looks like the very picture of the factory of the future. It rolls some of the Sandvik video in, but the behind-the-scenes stuff is great.

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A masonry drill bit has a tip made out of tungsten carbide, brazed onto the body of the drill. The bit is capable of withstanding the high impact and wear created by drilling into concrete and masonry. A high-strength masonry screw can be driven directly into this hole. Another fastening option (shown below) is to insert a plastic or metal sleeve into the hole and drive a screw into the sleeve.

It may be simple and generally safe to fasten to concrete, but it’s always a good idea to wear safety glasses, if nothing else to shield yourself from the dust that’s produced in the process.

But if you need a REALLY hard material, the next best thing to diamond is cubic boron nitride (CBN). Knoop hardness is about half that of diamond, while tungsten carbide is about a fifth that of diamond. (Fun fact: hard as it is, diamond nonetheless can’t be used for precision machining iron/steel because it forms iron carbide; messes up the cutting edge.)

Sleeve anchors are hybrid fasteners consisting of a threaded stud, a nut, and a specialized sleeve. You hammer this fastener into the hole then turn the nut no more turns than specified by the manufacturer (typically two to four). This causes the threaded stud to pull up in the sleeve. As it does so, the the sleeve expands against the wall of the hole, forming a tight wedging action. It’s important to read the manufacturer’s instructions before installing these. They are to be located specified distances from each other and from the edge of the slab.

With the carbide drill bit chucked in the drill, hold what you need to fasten to the wall and make your hole. For brackets and the similar pieces of hardware, use their mounting holes to place the drill bit. For wood, simply bore right through the wood and into the concrete.

Wear your safety glasses during every step of the process. Concrete chips can fly, a masonry screw may inadvertently break, you might even snap the drill bit itself if it gets bound up against a piece of reinforcing steel. All of this can cause debris to go flying.

Dan, I try to read every single article you write on Hackaday. I can’t say that for all Hackaday authors. Keep up the great content! Sometimes I swear YouTube must be serving us the same video feeds when I see watched videos resurface!

Turn the selector ring on the cordless drill, aligning the hammer icon with the white selector triangle. Move the drill’s speed selector switch to its top speed, 2 or 3, depending on the drill. Tighten the drill’s chuck on the masonry bit.

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Unfortunately, price seems to scale exponentially with hardness. Tungsten carbide inserts run around $5-10 each. A good friend owns a machine shop and has a surfacing machine specifically for milling heads. Happily, it uses only one CBN insert, because the last one he ordered from China ran over $200. (He’s my friend for life now because I found a package of ten new American-made inserts from someone who must not have known their value—$45 including shipping.)