re-riveting aluminum boats

[nitrotmaxx]

does anybody now a good way to rivet boats?

[Captain B.R.K]

Through this into the expert-equipment forum and I know you'll get a fast response from Steve Bakken. I've turned to him a number of times for boat questions!

[Steve Bakken]

You'll need what they call a cold rivet. It's a solid shank with a mushroom on one end. You insert it into the hole from the outside and hold it tight with a dolly while a partner hammers the other end into a flare from the inside. This will expand the shank and seal the hole. If you have alot to do, then I would recommend using and air hammer with a concave tip. This will save tons of time and sore arms.

[MossBoss95]

Find yourself a laid off Northwest mechanic and I bet they would rivet that thing up nice as we now have more time on our hands.

The best way is to rivet using a bucking bar and air hammer rivet gun and just make sure that the rivit you drill out is the same size as the shank of the rivet you are using or you will bend the rivet over and make a bigger mess than you have already. You also could use pull rivets with sealent but not the garden variety at the local hardware store, as they will be too week. Another fix would be a bold with sealent and that should also do the job. Just make sure to goop that thing up and seal the whole nut over on the inside.

[Phred52]

nitromaxx, many years ago, I replaced about 200 rivets in a CHEAP canoe I bought. I went to a local trucking firm and bought a bunch of rivets from them and went to work. Yes, they were the cold rivet as mentioned above. Not A leak and sold the canoe about 4 years later for 2x what I paid for it. Almost worth the hearing loss from hammering in the canoe to mushroom the rivets!

[Kab Dreamin]

I worked my way through college as a dock boy at a resort on Lake Kabetogama back in the early 80's. We had to re-rivet some of the boats from time to time to take care of leakers and we did it exactly like Steve Bakken suggests. Always worked like a charm. Take his advice. Use the air hammer.