Hello all As the title suggests, is it possible to make your own chassis rivets. I have a couple of early 40's chev pickup chassis. One has good rails and cross members but no spring hangers or brackets. The other has average rails and rust in the cross members but all spring hangers and brackets. The front spring hanger appears to have a long vertical rivet holding it in place. When I swap it to the good rails I would like to rivet it back in place. Therefor I need a long rivet. Advice on how to make would be good or does a company sell these extra long rivets for chev chassis. Steve
I would think the best way would be to just buy them, as far as where to buy, guess the first place I would look is the internet.
Not sure about where you are, but here we have a number of sources for solid rivets. And they are not expensive. I would think the biggest part of making your own would be getting the right temper so they would expand correctly. If they are 3/8" or larger you will most likely be heating they to install. I guess if I was to make my own I would try to talk to a blacksmith to get some insight. If you make some, let us know what you did.
Rivets are cheap, and would be real hard to make. If you can't find a manufacturer down under, I'm sure Jay-Cee would be willing to ship some... if not, hell, I'll pick some up and send 'em your way. https://www.rivetsonline.com/our-history
McMaster Carr has a huge selection of any sort of rivet you can need. What's so special about the rivet's you need?
Can you use rivet bolts? https://www.google.com/search?q=riv...0KHT9zAEEQ9QEwCXoECAQQOw#imgrc=i5R_OBvBLu7AgM:
they go up to 1" long, which is probably close.... but would need to know just how long "long" really is. Less than .813"?
Rivets are made by a cold header where the head and or shaft is cold formed . They take bar or coil stock and goes into a die usually made of carbide and smashes the material into a shape. So you can machine new ones but as said they are pretty cheap if you can find them. That being said something about making things for yourself just cause you can..
http://bigflatsrivet.com/ up to 2" and 3" long depending on diameter. Good stuff, along with accessories for setting rivets.
All well and good to find some, then you have to install them. Anything over 3/16" takes quite a squeeze to set them.
The rivets holds the bracket that holds the front spring shackles. It is fitted to the front of the frame rails on a 1942 Chev pickup chassis. It runs vertical through the top of the frame rail through the bracket and out the bottom. A distance of 2 3/4".The mushroomed head is 3/4" diameter but as I have not removed it yet don't know the shank diameter. As for installing it I was intending to borrow the pneumatic solid rivet hammer from work. It looks like I may have to bolt this in place. I was not sure if I could have turned up a shank on the lathe of suitable steel and used it as a rivet. Hence the question. If it could be made what grade of steel would suit. Thanks Steve
if you are near a big city, find the oldest hardware store you can find and ask them. probably down in the basement all crusty, been there since the war
I have never used rivets myself, but have been told that the biggest problem is that replacements can never be fitted to create as tight a joint as the factory did it originally. You can beat the crap out of the rivet, and form the head o/k, but the joint will not be tight. All the old movies from the 1930's of bridge and large building construction show red hot rivets being used, the idea that the rivet shrinks as it cools and tightens up the joint. The very last thing you need is a loose flexy chassis. If you decide to use rivets for aesthetics, it may require some concealed welding as well to hold it together rigidly. The purists will be horrified, but If I was doing this, I would be thinking seriously about high tensile fine threaded bolts with nylock nuts.
There's a channel on YouTube called Pakistani truck channel and they do all kinds of work on trucks from relining clutches rebuilding whole trucks. There's some good video of the men on there reriveting chassis back together. If you're planning on riveting its worth watching how they do it with simple tools.
I installed thousands of 3/8 rivets in jail cells while working on a prison project. They had to be heated and then backed up with a bucking bar while being hand hammered into correct fitment, no slack allowed. This was a two man job. Care had to be taken to strike the rivet properly or it would become deformed and the inspectors would reject it. An air hammer is used when available and gives better results. I think the mentioned rivet bolts could be a good alternative to consider.
AGREE! This it the one stop get everything you need site. Great guy that has been supplying rivets for 20 years or so. I'm a happy customer. Bob
I just replaced the front crossmember and four running board brackets on a Model A. As mikeyc outlines it's gonna take heat and a gun. If you can get someone to use the bucking bar it will help. With the Model A frame I was able o get a comfortable working position, but you might have issues getting into place. I would think about grade 5 or 8 bolts.
Hate to rain on your parade, @Warpspeed, but this is incorrect information. As long as care is taken in drilling out/removing the rivet, a replacement will create a joint just as strong as the original. If you've ever flown in an airplane, I guarantee you've been supported by thousands of replaced rivets. There are as many different rivet alloys as there are metal alloys, and each has its own considerations for installation, but they are definitely replaceable, and generally stronger than a bolt in the same situation, with some exceptions. This is due to both the fact that rivets and holes are matched to tight tolerances initially, and the act of driving the rivet eliminates any slop remaining, creating a very tight fit indeed. We'll leave the self-locking nut topic for another day.
Picked up a pneumatic rivet gun at a garage sale two years ago along with some differ bucking bars. Bought some metal rivets through McMaster-Car, 1/4” & 3/16”, not expensive at all. Riveted in several of the floor crossmembers in my coupe, easier than I expected, no heat. Just need the bucking bar placed squarely, cut the rivet to the proper length prior to bucking. End up with a tight connection. I’d rivet a whole frame if I need to. Sent from my iPhone using The H.A.M.B. mobile app
I use a USATACO 3X rivet gun for my bomber seats and chassie . We have a few local surplus materials suppliers that sell excess inventory and can find barrels of rivets there. The problem is your dont know alloy but on seats it doesn’t matter . The steel one you can spark test and test hardness of them. Ebay is a good source for surplus rivets and I just love the look of rivets ... Lots of good articles on the rivet and tolerances for hole and rivet size on the Hansen rivets site
The inmates would have disassembled the whole damn jail overnight! Some round head rivet bolts were used on the back side in the pipe chase areas of the cell blocks. Not accessible from the inmate side. We did have to spoil the threads after they were torqued. On another note doing rivets on bridges and steel structures was a way different issue. Before my time, however I did a several rivet removal and replace jobs on bridges. Hard ass work but great fun! Like shooting an automatic rifle all day!
Thanks for all of the replies. I had a look at the Pakistani trucks. I guess that is not the first day on the job as they make it look easy. There would not want to be any trust issues there. I am curious why the prison was riveted together and not welded. Welding would seem easier. Rivets in a chassis seems like and old and primitive way to do things, but having worked around aircraft rivets seem to be the preferred method. I guess we have been conditioned to thinking a nut and bolt has to be better than an old blacksmiths rivet. Steve
A rivet expands inside the joint, a nut and bolt only compresses it. That's why things like front crossmembers should be either properly riveted or welded, not bolted.
It's going to take a serous rivet gun/driver and someone who has a good grasp on what he is doing holding the bucking bar to get those set right. Still you should have some suppliers in Australia so you don't have to order from the US and pay more for shipping than for the rivets. Possibly ag equipment suppliers or your version of McMaster Carr. If you have to order from the US I do suggest McMaster Carr as small orders don't phase them in the least. They don't do the "you have to buy a box" they will sell you what you need on anything they sell I am going to assume that you are full and well aware what lengths you will need to have the proper crush on the rivet. Now show us the photos when you do it and get it done.
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