ABSTRACT
When the manufacturer puts the company's identification symbol on a fastener, purchasers can feel more confident about the product, for it means that the fastener maker stands proudly behind what he has made. While many consensus standards have required these markings for several years, the government and military standards often consider them optional. The result was to create a flood of fasteners that carried no manufacturer's marking and were then introduced into the stream of commerce in North America. Although this of itself should not have caused a problem, it did. The net result was the introduction of millions of counterfeit, or substandard, fasteners that were not traceable to known makers.
