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I'm good at accidentally splitting wood. I'm also flummoxed by the variety of screws available for wood working projects. Not wanting to "screw up" some nice hardwood:

Is a different type of screw preferred for screwing into softwood vs hardwood?

Does pitch or thread to shank ratio matter?

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    Always predrill the hole, especially for hardwoods.
    – Ashlar ♦
    Feb 26 '16 at 12:43
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    If you're worried about splitting the wood, you've got to predrill the screw holes. In general, you drill slightly larger holes in hardwood than in soft. Here's a machinist's guide to drilling for standard slot wood screws: engineershandbook.com/Tables/woodscrewpilotholes.htm Note that the shank hole size is the same, but the pilot holes are different where it's convenient.
    – WhatRoughBeast
    Mar 1 '16 at 22:25

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