leaking rivet ????????

[Cheers]

I did the fill the boat on the trailer with water trick and found a lose/leaking rivet . I have no easy access to it from the inside . Is there a way of tightening or replacing it from the outside ?

[Deitz Dittrich]

I had a boat that had leaks and tried many diff methods. Tried to calk it.. nope, tried aluma weld putty, nope.. epoxy.. nope.. there are some alum welding sticks that I have heard some people have success with, but when I heated the alum it bowed and that didnt work for me either.

ended up pulling the floor and re-rivet..

[Cliff Wagenbach]

There are pop rivets that will work if there is only one bad rivet.

They are slightly different then a regular pop rivet. Also use a good silicone calking when putting the rivet in.

Cliff

[witgey&water]

I have used closed end (blind) pop rivets with marine silicone and never have had a problem yet

Here is a picture or those rivets

[Rick G]

Redoing the rivets with closed end ones like witgey&water posted above would be the right way. If it were me this is how I would do it.

I have gone the way of using stainless bolt/nut witha rubber washer to replace the rivet for a short time.

You could also try using a block of wood on one side the rivet and gentaly hit the other side with a hard rubber mallet to try and tighten it.

[Tom7227]

This came up a while back and someone posted this link. I am not sure that the correct page will open but I know I found what folks were talking about back then.

http://www.hansonrivet.com/w02.htm

[Orlip]

I had this problem with my boat as well. I had to fill the boat with water mark the leaks and then drained the boat. Then I drilled out the old rivets and replaced with blind rivets as stated above however I used a spot of 3M 5200 around the hole before inserting the rivet. IMO that 5200 is hands down the best for below water sealants. This was 2 seasons ago and is dry every time I pull plug to date.

One other note is to make sure you get the aluminum rivet with aluminum mandrel. No rust.