Pops in the Slider Skirts - What to do now?

[BillSchlatterer]

Finally got the canopy side and rear skirts all riveted together, like the fit, but now what? I'm looking at the pop rivets and wondering about filling them with glass or just painting over them and letting them show.

If you prime and paint, does a normal double coat of epoxy primer "sorta" fill some and not others and leave them all looking a little different or does a coat or two of high fill primer fill them up?

For those that used a real filler like bondo or fiberglass, did you just mix up a batch of epoxy and ballons and then fill and sand? Did that completely cover the rivets or leave the outlines showing?

I "think" I am going to fill with epoxy and balloons, and then put a single layer of light 2 oz bid over all of them and be done with it but wondered what the pros and cons were before I got too far. ( seems like a lotta work

Similar question on the cowl rivets,.. did you just 1) prime and paint 2) cover with epoxy when you filled the pinholes and then paint or 3) epoxy and then layer of light glass? Pros & Cons ???

Comments and pix appreciated?

Thanks Bill S
7a finishing

 

[RV7Guy]

JB Weld

I did some tests with some pop rivets. I put them in a piece of scrap metal and cleaned them with acetone. I filled a couple of them with epoxy and micro balloons, a couple with Super-Fil and a couple of them with JB Weld.

After curing for a couple of days I whacked the metal around to try to get them to fail. All three held firm. The JB Weld sanded the easiest surprisingly. (it an epoxy base anyway) JB Weld is formulated to grab metal so I went with that when I needed to fill a couple of pop rivets here and there. Holding strong!!!

 

[RV7ator]

You'll be mixing mucho epoxy (like West Systems) for canopy and other fiberglass work. Mix the remnant in each batch with microballons and dribble a bit into each rivet with something pointy. Eventually. you'll can fill every rivet on the plane kinda painlessly. Time it right, like about six hours of cure, and you can easily shave the lumps off with a razor while in the plastic state so sanding becomes unnecessary.

None have ever loosened.

John Siebold
Boise, ID

 

[f1rocket]

I had this same problem on my Rocket. Unfortunately, the rivets used in this location are soft aluminum rivets so they don't over-squeeze the plexi and crack it. This also means that they usually loosen up over time depending upon vibrations, thermal cycles, etc.

Here's what I plan to do. I will cover the rivets with flox (not microballons) and then lay one ply of BID cloth over the entire skirt. Fill and sand and then not worry about them breaking through.