Recommend riveter for aluminum flat bar?

What would be a good riveter for aluminum flat bar? Not being able to weld, from time to time I do some drilling and screwing aluminum together. Riveting is better than using machine screws? What specific riveter kit or brand would be good for the kind of stuff (mostly aluminum flat bar) I usually work with, listed below?

Thanks.

Reply to
John Doe
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Probably a hand tool. Does being metric or SAE matter for availability of rivets?

Reply to
John Doe

John, I don't wish to rain on your parade, but I can tell you have no idea what your doing because of the half baked question. You asked about material choices in relation to bending ability, but you didn't specify what you were doing. We advised you about the characteristics of both 6061 and 6063. You went out and bought the same material anyway and now you want to know about fastening it. The best I can say is that you have put the cart in front of the horse. The construction issue along with any fastener system needs to be thought out BEFORE you buy the material. As far as rivets go, there are hundreds or different rivets and rivet methods. They all have their purpose and the correct tools, which can be very expensive. I can only assume you mean blind rivets (pop rivets), but there are many others. Again, without knowing what you are doing, you cannot expect perfection in our replies. There are a few considerations when using pop rivets. The first one is that these rivets can take considerable force, as the diameter of the rivet becomes larger. So a little cheap riveter is good for small 1/8" rivets only. Larger rivets need larger riveters. You must consider whether you need a swivel head or not. Do you have compressed air available. Do you have the space to use a air riveter? How do you intend to lock the pieces together, while riveting? This can be an issue, because you do not have the luxury of loose assembly before tightening. Steve

"John Doe" wrote in message news:4c58b087$0$4748$ snipped-for-privacy@news.astraweb.com...

Reply to
Steve Lusardi

Marsha,

Not in this thread.

Because I do not know for sure. Hopefully one thing will be making a much lighter push stick for inline skating. But, for some reason, getting a light version completed has been very difficult. I was able to take a stock electric scooter, hack it up, and convert it to a very heavy and bulky push stick. It works okay, but light weight would be much better.

One neat thing about UseNet is how radically independent authors are. Sometimes even the same author feels free enough to go against his own policy. One should enjoin and take advantage of that freedomness.

Even if the answers were all negative, how could I be sure that my question was expressed well enough so that the answers were right for me?

Yup. No big hurry though.

I design and make stuff. I like to have generic supplies on hand.

Perfection from someone who enjoys metalworking?

I use superglue for clamping aluminum flat bar together before drilling multiple holes. If necessary, the pieces are then separated and the glue is scraped off.

Reply to
John Doe

For simple rivetting of flat bar or strip together, theres nothing wrong with mans oldest tool. A hammer, with solid ali rivets. Cut yourself some test pieces Drill your 2 holes put the rivet through place the rivet head on a hard and firm surface face down, and hammer the protruding rivet shank to swell it and form another head., Nothing could be simpler. There are lots of tricks to do it fast and well ,but you have to start with the simplest of joints. Well help you progress once you have had you done your first test pieces. For hollow tube your better off using bolts and nuts unless you flatten the tube and use inserts of tube to strengthen the joint..

Adding to what others have said, that there are literally dozens of different rivetting systems which have been developed for every concieveable joining problem. From 1 inch red hot rivets in wrought iron heated on a coal or wood fuelled brazier, thrown up with a pair of tongs, caught in a bucket, pushed into 2 ships plates then sledged together by a couple of rivetters on one side and a dolly holder on the other, to the 2nd world war bombers that had 40,000 rivets holding them together. Mostly solid but many tubular ie pop rivets where a blind fix was needed. Using a hammer is very satisfying!! Let us all know how you get on. AND Dont be afraid to hit it!! Ted In Dorset UK. An old hammer man.

Reply to
Ted Frater

You can fasten that stuff together in literally hundreds of different ways. Figuring out which way to choose is called "engineering", I think. There are books and tables that you can use to figure out what sort of load each type of fastener can take. Use of same separates the basement hacker from the pro. From personal experience, I can tell you that buying a wall full of fasteners at one go is a waste of money, the exact one you need won't be there. That's the reason places like Fastenal exist. A hand riveting snap can be handy to have as can a pop riveter. If you've got a source of air, a rivet set and bucking bar can be handy accessories for a pneumatic chisel. Pick up rivets as needed, those assortments are only good if you need just a couple, they won't have enough of the same type for a whole project.

Nothing wrong with holding stuff together with screws and bolts, if designed properly. Some alloys don't take to tapping very well, though, self-tappers were designed for such.

Stan

Reply to
stans4

...

The "shank" is the long uniform part, opposite the head? I know what the shank of a drill bit is, but I am not familiar with the term used with stuff like screws and bolts.

Anyway... Is there a tool that can be used with a hammer, to shape a rivet on the opposite side of the head? I would probably not swing a hammer towards the aluminum for that. Using a hammer would eliminate the need for the rivet tool to reach far over the work. And a striking blow is probably more effective than clamping.

What are the most ordinary rivets called, that can be used for fastening two pieces of aluminum flat bar together?

Thanks.

Searching...

I find a grand total of four results for "solid ali rivets" and zero for "solid ali rivet".

Zero results for "hand riveting snap" mentioned in another reply.

Yes, this is topical stuff.

Reply to
John Doe

The "most ordinary rivets" today would probably be "pop" rivets that you can find at any Home Depot or the like.

The simplest are "solid aluminum rivets" that you can get from a variety of sources. You can set them with a ball peen hammer--takes a little practice to get a nice head on them but it can be done. You can get "rivet sets" that work in an air hammer but they take as much practice as a ball peen. There are also tools called "rivet squeezers" that work for some sizes of aluminum rivet.

You don't say how much load will be applied. If it's not a critical structural component then "pop" rivets would be your easiest bet--they're readily available and are easy to set in tubing since you only need access to one side. If you need more strength or a countersunk head there are mil-spec and aircraft grade pop rivets available for a price--the most common brand name is "Cherry". If you need more strength than that then you usually want hand-set rivets.

If you look through the "rivet" selections at you'll find a variety of options.

Reply to
J. Clarke

They're called solid rivets. They're just what they sound like.

As for tools, there are many different kinds. I use several sets that are around 70 years old -- standard rivet sets, or rivet headers. They're around

6" or 7" long, forged steel, with a tapered shank. They're meant to use in a hardy hole in an anvil but I hold them in my massive bench vise.

They have a shallow, cup-shaped hole in one end, and, on the same end, a cylindrical hole for driving the unheaded end into, to drive together the pieces you're riveting together.

Standard use is to drive the epieces together, and then put the round end of the rivet into the cup, and peen over the edges of the straight end of the rivet with a ball peen hammer. Then you take the other rivet set (mine are in pairs) and place it on top of the peened part, then whack it to give a smooth, rounded shape to the end you're hammering.

There are other ways to use them. Blacksmiths have some other tools for this. They call the set you put under the rounded, factory head a rivet set -- often it's flat on the bottom, to lay flat on the anvil. Then the companion tool, used to shape the peened head, is called a "cupping tool." It's similar to the rivet sets I've described above but it's usually just a bar with a cup in the end.

For aluminum and copper rivets, you can easily make your own by just starting a drill bit in the end of a bar of steel. If you want to get a fancy, rounded head, you can use the method of your choice to round out that cup.

This is a very quick and simple process. If you're using small rivets, it's just "whack, whack, whack." That's with iron rivets, which I usually use. Aluminum and copper are even faster.

Don't over-whack the aluminum, or th edges of the hammer-formed head will crumble.

This is *old* stuff. You need to ask old people, like most of us on this NG. d8-)

Reply to
Ed Huntress

"Ed Huntress" fired this volley in news:4c59be73$0$4977$ snipped-for-privacy@cv.net:

The solution to an inexperienced hand, and that very problem you mention, is to use countersunk rivets. It requires a lot less skill to just "whack it until it's flat" than to nicely form a head.

LLoyd

Reply to
Lloyd E. Sponenburgh

Best thing to do is probably get a box of rivets from Mcmaster or wherever, drill a row of holes in a piece of strip, and keep setting rivets until he's comfortable with the process.

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Reply to
J. Clarke

I beg to differ, countersunk are the hardest to get right. The rivet should be inserted all the way flat before riveting and just enough to expand the other side the right amount. Just under twice the size of the hole IIRC. The two materials should be held together as best as possible so that the rivet doesn't expand between the two, think clecos or as the OP said super glue.

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Many many fond memories as a kid with the thin arms playing bucking bar mate contorted through bulkheads and inspection holes in aircraft. Oh, there's one right now... Boy does it get hot inside airplanes! There's another... Tracing wires when they are all the same color and hundreds of them, one mental slip and it is right back to zero. LOL

SW

Reply to
Sunworshipper

Sunworshipper fired this volley in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

I find them to be the easiest solid rivet to do properly.

It is important with _any_ kind of solid rivet to make sure the work pieces are clamped tight during the clinching, and that the head is tight to the work.

If a countersunk rivet is a little too long, you hammer it down into its countersink just like you would normally, then file or grind off the excess to get it flush.

It's really _quite_ easy to do -- at least for me. I've done a metric butt-load of them.

YMMV.

LLoyd

Reply to
Lloyd E. Sponenburgh

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The surface needs to be more than hard and firm -- it also needs to be massive relative to the hammer being used. For portable use, the common thing is called a "bucking bar" -- and the simplest would be a bar of steel held end on to support the rivet head. (You may want to turn down the middle of the length to make gripping it easier, but let's say an overall diameter of 1" to 1-1/2" for small rivets, and eight to twelve inches long. Of course, if you have an anvil, and the workpiece can be moved to the anvil, that is all you need other than the hammer, and if you want the results to *look* nice a rivet set (think of a center punch with a domed hole in the end to form the rivet instead of a sharp point).

With the caveat that if there are more than the two holes which you mention -- you will need something to hold everything in alignment as you insert and form the rivets. The common tool for this is the Cleeco -- which comes in various sizes for different diameter rivets -- and which requires a special tool to install and remove.

For the larger pop rivets, there are hand pumped hydraulic pullers which can be used.

And if you need to provide threads in some sheet metal, the Rivnut is a nice thing, with the special tool for installing them. (Sort of like a pop rivet, but hollow with internal threads instead of a break-off pin.) For sizes up through 10-32 or 10-24 with aluminum Rivnuts, there are lever operated hand tools which are quite easy to use. For larger sizes, and steel rivnuts, you will again want the hydraulic tools.

There are even rivets intended for blind use which are split on the inside end, and have a protruding pin which you hit with a hammer to expand the inside behind the hole.

BTW The original poster's articles I will not see, because I have killfiling on the "real name" "John Doe". So I only see the questions as quoted by others. I forget what it was which caused me to add that to the killfile, but I'm probably not going to take it out.

Enjoy, DoN.

Reply to
DoN. Nichols

Imaginary kill file friends are unruly, they come and go. Sometimes they disappear just so the author has an excuse to once again troll the allegedly "kill filed" person. Besides, you run into problems of nym-shifting authors that confuse your imaginary kill file friend. Kill files are just messy, especially when used by the unskilled.

If you want to avoid fumbling around, an Ignore SubThread filter is most effective. You can ignore specific thread branches, or you can ignore the whole thread. Nice and easy content-based filtering that works like a charm. It is the filter of filters.

Reply to
John Doe

Which DoN is NOT.

Look for homebuilt aircraft construction books.

jsw

Reply to
Jim Wilkins

To each their own. File grind ! Flush are much easier to change the numbers without sanding into the rivets, the dimpled ones just plain suck for that procedure. With the later the gun never hits the skin and is much stronger in more ways than just stressing and flattening the material that will more likely crack.

SW

Reply to
Sunworshipper

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That looks similar to what I hear you saying.

I suppose one or more of this tool from McMaster-Carr would be useful.

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Roughly speaking, is that it (plus a hammer and rivets) for solid riveting?

YouTube could use some better videos on riveting IMO. One of them starts out as "Solid Riveting 101 part 1". About halfway through, the guy goes on and on and on about the protruding end length of the rivet having to be 1 1/2 times the diameter of the rivet, and then the video ends, apparently without a part 2.

Reply to
John Doe

Is that a bone of contention?

Reply to
John Doe

Sunworshipper fired this volley in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

We're TALKIN' 'bout hand-hammered riveting on a small job (that so far doesn't appear life-critical). We are NOT talking about a guy going out and buying a rivet gun for five or six (or even sixty) holes.

Not all jobs require top-end tools. One of the first responders said it best when he cited a hammer as the only basic tool required.

LLoyd

Reply to
Lloyd E. Sponenburgh

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