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The Fastener Delivery System (FDS) provides a new and unique method to automatically feed fasteners. The FDS is a compact automated system that conveys fasteners on demand to a user-supplied end effecter. The system may consist of up to six basic elements: a drum, a drum positioning system, a fastener lifting assembly, an escapement head, a jib crane, and a computer control system. Systems are currently in use at Boeing’s Advanced Manufacturing Center in St. Louis, Missouri for the automated assembly of the F/A-18E Super Hornet. Each system can store over 8000 fasteners of 400 different varieties. Rivets, slave bolts, and threaded fasteners are conveyed on demand in non-sequential order with no changeover. Fastener dimensions range from head diameters of 4mm to 22mm and lengths from 6mm to 58mm. The fasteners are stored in tubes, which are arranged in a high-density, radial pattern in precision machined covered drums. The drums act as “mini-warehouses”.