[prkaye]

You know that situation when the dimpler comes down not quite centered and nicks the edge of your hole, and it causes you to have a second hole overlapping the first? What is the usual remedy for this? Buy a new skin? Drill out to #30 and use a larger rivet? fabricate some kind of little "washer" out of aluminum, to mask the bad hole?

 

[Kahuna]

Redimple the hole correctly, and press on. You can fill the imperfection at paint time. Dont get too wrapped up about a bad rivet hear or there.

Best,

 

[TShort]

It depends somewhat on how far off the new hole is; I did this once, and it created a hole too big for a -3 rivet. I redrilled both parts, dimpled with the #30 dies, and put a -4 rivet in there. It really isn't as noticeable as you might think ... would be tough to pick out among the thousands of rivets (esp with paint).

Like kahuna said, if it is just a small defect, deburr it, redimple, rivet like normal and go on.

Thomas

 

[prkaye]

Well I have to go at least to a #30, otherwise I'm not sure there would be enough material under the rivet head. Even with a #30 it's not perfect, but at least it covers the hole completely. It's only a stiffener rivet, so not a huge concern structurally.

Question: Do AN426 (flush) rivets come in diameters greater than AD-4 ? On Van's webstore, there don't appear to be any listed... or do they have a completely different code for those larger diameters?

 

[Red Voodoo]

Phil,
I'm looking at the MS20426 spec right now, and it shows diameters all the way to 3/8". I know McMaster-Carr has them up to 3/16". By the way, the MS spec has been replaced with NASM20426 (Van's uses the AN426 designation, which is several generations out of date). MS20426AD5 would get you a 5/32" diameter rivet, if you really need it.