Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 11:58:51 -0600 From: Darren DeLoach Subject: COZY: Fuel valve bracket rivets I know nothing about working with rivets or sheet metal (so I have no specific tools for such). For the 4 rivets holding the nutplates to the aluminum bracket to hold the fuel valve: Do I use my countersink on the sheet to create the indentation for these rivets, or do I have to get one of the "dimpling" tools I see in the catalogs? Can I just take a hammer and pound these particular rivets, or do I need some more substantial setup? (When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail....) What are other folks doing here? -- Darren DeLoach http://www.deloach.com Chap. 6 From: Don Bowen Subject: COZY: Fuel Valve Bracket Rivets Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 13:33:06 -0500 Per plans, the rivets holding the nutplates are to be countersunk. I used my electric drill, with a countersink cutter mounted in a 'stop' cage to get the correct depth. The counter sink cutter and micro-stop cage should be available from Wicks, ASS, or you could borrow one from a 'tin-bender' in your eaa chapter. You can drill the countersink without the stop cage, but caution must be exercised to avoid going too deep. Try this on a scrap piece first. I personnaly do not like to use a rivet gun on such a small part. I set my rivets with a hand-squeezer. Not everyone would have one of these in their tool box, mine is a left-over from my A&P days. You could form the shop head of the rivet using a hammer and a drift, with the manufactured head resting on a hard, smooth surface such as an anvil. These are small rivets, brute force is not required. An alternative would be to make a rivet hand-squeeze from a pair of vice grips. The jaws must be smooth to avoid damaging the surfaces. My $.02 worth. Don Bowen donbow@symix.com Mk IV s/n 440 Chapter 9 Date: Tue, 10 Feb 1998 11:06:30 -0800 Subject: Re: COZY: Fuel valve bracket rivets From: alwick@juno.com (ok How) You don't need special tools. You have two main problems to solve if you use hammer. 1) You must hold the two components together with considerable force while hammering. Finger pressure won't cut it. Using a bolt threaded into the nutplate works just fine. If you don't have the two components clamped tight, the rivet will often expand between the components and you'll end up with gap between components. 2) The flared end of rivet must have pressure forcing it into c'sink during hammer operation. If you do c'sink to correct depth, then laying the whole assy flat against a smooth anvil type object will work fine. You need two pairs of hands. One holds assy flat to anvil, other does hammering. However, if c'sink is little deep, then you are going to compromise the appearance by just laying the whole assy flat against anvil. Deep c'sinks require a steel shim between rivet flare and flat surface. 3) Don't use rivets too long. Instead of compressing, rivet will roll over and look ugly. Trim them to length if needed. That's it! Good luck. -al wick 70% comp. Cozy MkIV with Subaru engine. Computerized cockpit. Selling C150 soon. On Tue, 10 Feb 1998 11:58:51 -0600 Darren DeLoach writes: >I know nothing about working with rivets or sheet metal (so I have no >specific tools for such). > >For the 4 rivets holding the nutplates to the aluminum bracket to hold >the >fuel valve: > >Do I use my countersink on the sheet to create the indentation for >these >rivets, or do I have to get one of the "dimpling" tools I see in the >catalogs? > >Can I just take a hammer and pound these particular rivets, or do I >need >some more substantial setup? (When all you have is a hammer, >everything >looks like a nail....) > >What are other folks doing here? > >-- Darren DeLoach >http://www.deloach.com >Chap. 6 > _____________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com Or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866]