DaleB

DaleB

Well Known Member
I don't know if I'm doing something wrong, or if it's a tool issue. I usually tend to take the blame for mistakes, but I really have not been able to figure out what I'm doing wrong here.

Early in my build I bought a stainless hand squeezer, which I believe is P/N 65005 from the Yard Store. More and more I have noticed that I very seldom get a good, flat shop head on flush rivets. They always seem to have a little bit of "tilt" to them, no matter how carefully I make sure the dies are centered on the rivet and that I keep everything aligned while squeezing. I think the rivets are OK structurally; the shop head isn't off center or malformed, other than the end being at a slight angle rather than parallel to the sheet. If I do a row of rivets, they'll all be pretty consistent -- about the same angle and all the same direction. Like I said, I think they are fine structurally but it's embarrassing to see the shop heads looking crooked. Is this common? Is it me or the tool?
 
Could the yoke be flexing?

I made up my mind from the beginning about going with the Main Squeeze by Cleaveland. I've heard nothing but good things about it and the Geezer Squeezer.
 
Try reversing how you squeeze the rivets---------if you have been putting the fixed anvil on the shop head, try putting it on the factory head instead.

I find that I do a much better job with the fixed anvil on the factory head.

Also, whichever way you are doing it, put a little pressure on the factory head first, to keep the rivet in place before you squeeze it.
 
I have trouble setting the AD4s with my little Avery hand squeezer. It just doesn't have enough heft to it to stay straight on the tails. I can sneak up on the rivet and make sure I'm pulling straight. But, as soon as I give that final squeeze the torque on the handle invariably pulls the yoke slightly out of line, resulting in a less than perfectly formed shop head.

I bought a used Chicago Pneumatic squeezer. With a little practice, it works great. If I ever need to sell tools, those things tend to hold their value pretty well. Or, so I've been told anyway. :)
 
The dies have a slight crown to them and I have the same thing happen with my Avery. I do notice that the degree is more pronounced with the 4" no hole yoke, so typically use the three inch with both dies in place.

It could be combination of dies, yoke flex, and operator. This assumes that everything starts out square. You might try to set a lone rivet on top of a die and squeeze it to help track down the issue. It may be necessary to put it in the vise to accomplish this task. Rotate the dies etc to follow the trail.

Good luck, it seems the pursuit of quality invariably leads to knowledge. At least, I am finding that to be true.

After a tough engineering project that was well outside of the normal product design limits, we were late on the aggressive development schedule and after telling the VP why, and what we learned, he said D***it, I didn't want you to learn anything just test it and put it in production!! He had a finance degree.
 
If you run two flat dies together and squeeze, you can see the amount of yoke deflection. It's often pretty significant. One habit I learned (right or wrong) from long time production sheet metal guys is to give the squeeze a swing at the final set. The rotation of the set 90 or 180 degrees (or whatever you can get) will flatten out the tail and "hide" the fact that the yoke is distorting.
 
BillL said:
He had a finance degree.
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Guys like that can and often do kill entire companies if they rise high enough.
Toobuilder said:
If you run two flat dies together and squeeze, you can see the amount of yoke deflection. It's often pretty significant. One habit I learned (right or wrong) from long time production sheet metal guys is to give the squeeze a swing at the final set. The rotation of the set 90 or 180 degrees (or whatever you can get) will flatten out the tail and "hide" the fact that the yoke is distorting.
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I'm going to do some experimenting this evening on some scrap to see if I can isolate the cause. I'm seeing this with 3/32 rivets, not a lot of force required... but maybe it's the combination I'm using. Maybe it's just my technique.

I tend to use one of the taller flat sets on the outer end to reach around hinges and stuff; maybe I need to focus more on using the thinnest possible set that will get the job done without interference.
 
The OPs link was to a TATCO or a copy of a TATCO. Setting AD3s should be a non-issue with any of the provided jaws and in any orientation as long as the jaws are aligned to the rivet. Can be done one handed.

AD4s are a different matter. Any jaws other than the pictured 1.5" throat will flex too much to make a flat shop head. If that jaw did not fit, I would use the gun and bar.

****Just saw the recent post above******
Loose and tall sets will do that. I have a 3/4" tall one that I made for a longeron yoke. It's 3/16 stem is loose. I have to be very careful with that one to not cause a crooked rivet.

Use the ram travel as a "poor mans" longeron yoke, instead of long sets. Sometimes I even adjusted the ram AFTER getting around the offending flange.

+1 for Toolbuilders tip about repositioning the squeezer when necessary.
 
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Rather than squeezing with the rivet positioned at the centre of the dies try positioning the rivet at the inner edge of the dies ( in relation to the yoke ).

Fin
9A
 
Be sure that your rivet length is correct. I have found that longish rivets tend to skew a bit like this.
 
Charles in SC said:
If the rivet length is not to long you probably need a better squeezer.
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So the situation of one fellow having difficulty means that an entire line of squeezers that have built hundreds of craft is no good?

No way will I trade a Tatco for a main squeeze or any pneumatic.
 
Your squeezer is probably OK. I would think your dies are suspect.

When building I had the shaft of one of my dies snap off and found that the replacement from Avery's had a slight crown but the dies from www.ustool.com were perfectly flat and parallel.

(For the record, I built my plane with an Avery's with various yokes.)
 
rzbill said:
So the situation of one fellow having difficulty means that an entire line of squeezers that have built hundreds of craft is no good?

No way will I trade a Tatco for a main squeeze or any pneumatic.
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RZBill, I think you misunderstood me. I did not say anything about any brand or line of squeezers, if the shop head is wrong the rivet is to long or something is going out of square during the squeeze. The link posted shows a kit with the squeezer, yolks, and sets coming as package. Maybe there is a quality control problem with only that one tool kit. Whatever the deal may be if every thing is right and tight fitting it should squeeze straight within it's design limits. -3 rivets should be no problem for it unless something is wrong with it. I do not see the word "Tatco" on the link anywhere. I have seen even high quality brand name tools have issues.
 
Not Getting straight rivet tails with hand squeezer

Do you run a drill bit through the hole before squeezing. I found the running a drill bit through the hole even if the rivet seems OK vastly improves the quality of the squeezed rivet tail.

Rocky
 
Yoke flex

Your problem maybe associated with yoke flex. All yokes flex, it just depends how much. The more force it takes to set a rivet the more the yoke will flex. The deeper the throat of the yoke the more it will flex compared to the shorter throat yoke (in general). The geometry of the yoke (ie the shape, cross section etc) play a role in the stiffness of the yoke.

I have a lot of experience with most of the different hand squeezers past and present (Tatco, Tatco copies, Avery, Cleaveland, ATI-SnapOn) and fundementally it all boils down to quality of the yoke. I am not addressing the weight, which squeezer has a lower handle force, which handles flex more etc. Just the yoke differences.

The Tatco and their imported copies my look simular but the yoke material may vary resulting in more flex then the other. The Avery/Cleaveland hand squeezers use a standard aviation squeezer interface (used for the pneumatic squeezers) and are machined not cast like some of the other brands. In my experince these machined yokes perform better then the cast yokes. It is possible to design a yoke with minumal flex for the work we do but it would be significantly heavier.

If you are setting rivets that are near the edge of the material you will always get better results using the yoke with shorter throat depth then the deeper throat depth.
 
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