An automated press feeds a string of tack pins loaded on a reel. The press shears the part from the string of fasteners and delivers each part individually to a punch for installation. The string of fasteners is pulled from the reel by a sprocket which includes peripheral teeth for engaging the fasteners and for feeding them in a vertical column to a shear station. A horizontally reciprocal shear block severs individual fasteners one-at-a-time from the end of the fastener string at the shear station, each fastener being indexed to the next shear position by incremental rotation of the sprocket. The punch includes vacuum retaining means for lifting each fastener from the shear block.