Solid Blind Pop rivets for aluminum hull repair

[carpedium]

I have a few loose rivets, and short of bucking them home it looks like these are the next best solution:

http://www.rivetsonline.com/rivets-en/b ... ivets.html

Does anyone know where I can get a pop rivet tool that will handle a 1/4" rivet in the rochester area?

[W.W.IV.]

Try Home Depot.

[rolmops]

You will find it quite hard to draw the rivets tight enough to stop the leaks. Aluminum boats use rivets that are airplane grade,not Home Depot grade. Unless you have some serious riveting tools,you might as well forget it.

Another way to do this is,is using fine threaded stainless steel truss headed Philips bolts with washers on the nut side and the nuts with the nylon inside.Make sure that the bolts are the same width that the rivets are and have a friend help you tighten the bolts on the inside of your boat. Usually the 3/4 or 1 inch long bolts are fine to work with. You can literally exchange every last rivet with a bolt on your boat using this trick. You can dip every bolt in "M5200" to make sure there are no leaks.

A cheap place to get the bolts is "Herbs fasteners" just off Lyle ave in Rochester

Herbs Fastener and Supply, Rochester NY 14606

Herbs.Fastener.and.Supply.585-254-7640...

Herbs Fastener and Supply is located at 389 Lombard St Rochester, NY. Phone: 585-254-7640. .

Even when you use this system ,it is still a prudent idea to use "Gluvit" in the leaky areas.

Good Luck.

[carpedium]

WWIV, unfortunately Home Depot, or every tool store I could google didn't have one of these tools. As rolmops stated it has to be pretty heavy duty to handle 1/4".

Rolmops,

Thank you for your input!

I was originally going to go with the SS bolt method, but I got read the riot act over at Iboats and hulltruth a while back for bringing that up. I guess the problem is with dissimilar metals and corrosion. Its probably a long shot that it will cause me problems.. both pretty stable metals but I am not an expert in that area and the rivets are already in the mail.

It turns out my buddy has a heavy duty pneumatic rivet gun that will drive these home. I plan to dip these in flex-seal marine epoxy prior to engaging. I also have a gallon of gluvit on its way to my house that I plan to slather with reckless abandon all over the inside of the hull after the leaking rivets are replaced.

After that the new floors are going in and the whole thing is getting sprayed with light tan 2-part bedliner. I am looking forward to being able to hose the thing out on the inside after every trip!

[t2al]

just add 3M 5200 in the hole and a bit on the rivets. It work fine,i did it on my islander.

[W.W.IV.]

[rolmops]

The Gluvit will work a lot better if you warm up the area where you apply it.

As for difference in metals and the electrolysis problems, the good I-boaters (I am one of their admirals) have a point where salt water is involved, but in fresh water and with anodes there is no corrosion of the stainless or the aluminum. Even in salt water the stainless steel bolts are routinely used which is fine as long as the anodes are in good shape.

Are you spraying the bedliner onto wood? If so,let me know how it works out.

[jimski2]

My Starcraft Mariner had a couple loose rivets and a bad floor. I pulled the floor and fixed the loose rivets that spun in their holes. I found larger rivets than the ones supplied and drilled the new holes to fit the rivets. We then set the hull aluminum to hold the rivets without spinning and then peened the new rivets. It turned out that we ended up putting 268 rivets in the old boat. A new floor and the old boat was good for several more years. Then the transom brace cracked and the engine was flopping around and we bought a new boat. An old product called Permatex is what they built aircraft with and it is a little soft so it does not become brittle could work on loose rivets.

[carpedium]

All great info. Now I need to make a decision on decking.

[kchamp]

can you get to both sides of the rivets? you put tungsten steel on the one side in the boat while the guy uses a rivet gun that hits the rivet like a hammer drill, looks just like the factory did it. The old man did mine for me in our old boat, he has all the tools

[lumberman]

i got my 1/4 inch rivet tool at harbor freight

[carpedium]

Yup, these went in without a problem. I would recommend the pop rivets to anyone.

The standard rivets would have also worked, but there were some areas where I could not get to both sides still.

[ERABBIT]

An old product called Permatex is what they built aircraft with and it is a little soft so it does not become brittle could work on loose rivets.

I worked in a paper mill and we used this product a lot for sealing main heads on chest walls , water pumps and many other things that need a new seal.................heads up there are at least two types one stays soft and the other gets hard as steel.............

[carpedium]

Here's a video:

[mblaney]

I have a manual riveter like this one:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1-8-1-4-Heavy-D ... ls&vxp=mtr

Mine is made in England, bought it locally at a fastener store. I think I paid around $75 about 15 years ago. Very nice tool.