Hello, I have really done a lot of research on this and will happily pay $$ for 6 bolts for my chair. I just reassembled it and managed to do it using the bolts for my Grete Jalk chairs. They have the right threads per inch and size but they don't have a countersunk hex key head.
Here is what I know about my Grete Jalk bolts. They appear to be a #12, 28 threads per inch which might translate to bigger than 5mm but up to 6mm with a .9mm pitch?
These don't work: M5 bolts with .8 pitch or M6 with a 1.0 pitch
I think the required length is 5 cm or less.
Can anyone possibly help me please? I am really wondering why a standard metric bolt won't work too. I'm also wondering why what appears to be an imperial measured bolt works for danish furniture.
Many thanks in advance!
Donna
It is an imperial bolt. It wasn't until perhaps the late 1960s or early 1970s that the Danes had generally switched over to metric in the furniture industry. It isn't so easy to switch over when all your tooling is denominated in imperial. To take an example, the shop would have had imperial sized drill bits and so they would want imperial sized bolts to fit the holes just right. From what I have seen architects designed in metric, but then those measurements were converted to imperial with a little rounding. Then the measurements we re-converted to metric, with some rounding, for publication in Denmark. And then often those doubly converted numbers were again converted with rounding to imperial for publication in the USA. So catalogs sometimes had measurements that weren't so accurate with 3 conversion and rounding passes.
@donna-macisaacgmail-com Try the McMaster-Carr website if you haven't already. Lots there for screw-heads (like me) and, FWIW, I'm pretty sure the fasteners you're looking for can be called either screws or bolts depending on application.
What size machine screws did you order that did not fit?
I have replaced the screws for a Reenskaug rocker before, years ago, and I got something at a local hardware store. I don’t ever remember seeing or using 12-28 screws in my entire lifetime. Usually I see 10-24 and then it skips over to the saner 1/4”-20 fractional inch system for everything thicker. 12-28 apparently exists as a denomination and #12 wood screws do exist, but it strikes me as one of those specifications for a machine screw that exist on paper but not at the store.
Welcome and thank you, @skylar. Very helpful! Could you measure overall length and length of non-threaded portion of the shaft, too? Maybe a photo with a ruler included would be good enough.
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