Developed in the late 1800’s, the acorn nut became widely used for applications like windshield brackets. It ensured that no one would get hurt on an exposed end of a threaded bolt. Over the years, closed-end acorn nuts have been used in many applications for consumer safety and to keep the thread damage free. The traditional way to produce a closed-end acorn nut is to form a nut and then weld a cap onto the nut to enclose it.
Fast Forward to Today
Mundelein’s engineering team received a call from a customer. They were using a non-metallic cap fastener in a door hinge to protect consumers from hurting themselves, however, the non-metallic fastener was breaking apart due to extreme weather conditions.
Two Senior Applications Engineers worked with the customer to develop an open-ended acorn nut that would provide a solution. This open-ended acorn nut has several benefits:
- It is cost-competitive to the plastic parts.
- It has a paint cutter, which clears the paint, so the acorn nut can thread on easily without galling.
- It helps to plate the inside of the dome of the acorn nut.
- It solves the issue of the part breaking up since it is made of metal.
This reengineered acorn nut has been very successful, and it is being used for applications in multiple vehicles.
The teamwork and creative thinking to solve a customer’s problem strikes close to the core of the MacLean-Fogg mission statement to add value to our customers.
Before Reengineering
After Reengineering
Acorn Nuts