Come meet Fastbolt at the Greenville Convention Center! Fastbolt will participate in the Southeast Design-2-Part trade show this November 9–10th. Join us and learn how we can help you tackle supply chain issues and risk mitigation and keep your fasteners and other components in stock. We specialize in program management and application engineering and customize them to meet your needs. Event Details When: November 9 & 10, 2022 Hours: Wednesday 9:30 am–3:00 pm Thursday 9:30 am–3:00 pm Where: Greenville Convention Center, Greenville, SC Event Details: d2p.com/2022-greenville-manufacturing-tr ..read more

Engineers, buyers, management, and owners gathered—for the first time after the pandemic—looking for help and ideas on their fastener and tooling needs. We were delighted to demonstrate our latest battery-operated tooling for rivets and nuts, all for production-level requirements! Tools that require little to no maintenance and no need to “drag” a hose around for those tight spot areas. Here’s some of the highlights, in case you missed the 2022 Design-2-Part Show in Greenville. Much To-Do About Rivet Nuts Much curiosity was centered around rivet nuts (a.k.a., Rivnuts). A reliabl ..read more

In our last blog, we discussed the many attributes of fasteners: shapes, materials, coatings and plating, different heads, and drivers. Now, the actual fasteners themselves! Fasteners come in diverse types, given the limitless applications. Each of those types also has many subsets. Among the numerous types of fasteners, here are many of the most common ones. Type of Fastener Bolts What is a bolt? Bolts are one of the more common threaded fasteners used to hold two non-threaded pieces together. A bolt head, which comes in several varieties, is attached to the threaded male end ..read more

In July, the House of Representatives passed an $839 billion policy bill that would increase President Joe Biden’s requested Pentagon budget by $37 billion, reflecting bipartisan cooperation in Congress to raise military spending with a view on new threats from Russia and China. It includes billions for more aircraft and ships. Military budgets around the world are about to get bigger. This is most notable in Europe, where the threat of Russian aggression looms largest. Most NATO member countries are now implementing or proposing increases in defense spending that will make 2% of GDP the floor ..read more

The Russian invasion of Ukraine and the short positions that traders were forced to cover impacted many global commodities markets, with one commodity, in particular, impacting our industry: nickel. During March, all concerned heard a great deal about the volatility in nickel prices on the London Metals Exchange (LME) and its impact on stainless steel. Why is Nickel so important for our industry? There Are Two Types of Nickel. Nickel traded on the LME is so-called Class 1 nickel, which must be at least 99.8% pure. But about half of the world’s nickel is less refined Class 2 metal, most of ..read more

One of the key services Fastbolt provides our customers focuses on managing compliance-related activities.  With that in mind, through our controls and processes within the supply chain, we assist our customers with Quality and Regulatory compliance requirements to facilitate: Enhancing customer satisfaction by ensuring that customer requirements are being identified. Ensuring that only high-quality products enter our supply chain.  Ensuring that product conformity is measured. Utilizing a variety of quality control and assurance services, Fastbolt ensures that your fasteners, proc ..read more

Customers who have chosen to consolidate their components or reduce the number of components with us have found that it can bring significant benefits. This can include access to superior processes and products, improved, cost-effective components, and a hassle-free service that suits their production needs. Customers have also found that our global supply chain management model enables them to quickly scale up their buying strategy, reducing the number of components, reducing in-placement costs, and consolidating suppliers for every component.  Industrial Supply Chain Management: Where T ..read more

“Kitting” is the physical act of bundling multiple fasteners and other component SKUs into a single package and creating a new SKU for that package before shipping. Kitting fasteners allow manufacturers to streamline processes, lower shipping costs, and fulfill orders more quickly, ultimately increasing customer satisfaction. In-house assembly is often very cost-prohibitive for businesses, so using kitting services keeps costs low and can free up the retailer to focus on selling products. For example, one form of kitting that has become popular in recent years is kitting parts for online sales ..read more

Managing an effective supply chain is a crucial aspect of running a successful business, and with significant global supply chain issues expected to continue this year and possibly beyond, it is a key area of concern. Industries from automotive to telecommunications and even aerospace have been significantly impacted.  In today’s post, we consider the critical importance of building and maintaining a strong supply chain management system, and offer a few strategies to help keep your supply chain resilient throughout the current crisis and beyond.  What Is Supply Chain Management and ..read more