I want to purchase a rivet gun that will compress the solid and semi tubular rivets that are used in window channels, vent windows, etc. Anyone have experience with a particular brand and or have recommendations. I have found them online, but thought it a good idea to ask before buying. Thanks, Mark.
if the rivet is fairly easy to access from both sides, you may find a rivet 'squeezer' beneficial. Lower cost, by far, than a decent rivet gun and less difficult to manage for small rivets. Look in aircraft suppliers catalogs. i.e Aircraft Spruce, Chief Aircraft Parts, and others you can find with Google. You night also see if there is an aircraft repair shop at your local airport where an aircraft mechanic (A&P) might be willing to do this for you at a far lower cost than buying the air tool. The rivet gun is basically an air hammer, but has much more control of force by finer trigger throttling, and IS NOT the same as a regular air hammer.
I bought a air rivet gun from harbor freight. It does 1/8"-1/4" rivets of any type. I work in a collision shop and it gets used a lot by me and everybody else in the shop. My last one lasted about 15 years before it wore out. Oops, I thought you meant pop rivets pay no attention to me. Posted using the Full Custom H.A.M.B. App!
Ok, so rivetsinstock and Aircraft Spruce both sell a Tatco brand 3" reach rivet squeezer. Anybody used one of these? And what about the rivets? They have truss head and oval head? I called rivetsinstock the other day and the guy I spoke to didn't seem to know any more than me, and that's not much.
Truss head looks like a screw head.........but by 'oval head'...do you mean countersunk....i.e. tapered under the head? That is a countersink rivet (aka flush head) that when used correctly, leaves no rivet above the surface. What is required in the window channels?
There is some discussion on this over on the Garage journal http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=168336 Also Tatco does sell direct ... a little off topic but A school bus is built with a lot of rivets and seems like more on Friday afternoon when the pneumatic rivet gun gives up and you have to do them by hand.
All the rivets are 5/32 and 3/16. The smaller ones look solid, and the larger look tubular. None of them show as they are all in the window channels or vent window on my 50 Merc. There is either rubber or felt over them, but nothing can stick out on either side. I'm going to call rivetsinstock again and see if I can get more info. Sounds like the tatco squeezer will work. I just need to find out exactly their terminology on the rivets so I can get the right ones, and the right dies to crimp them. Thanks for everyone's help.
The Jalopy Journal
