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Tip: adjustable back riveting bucking partner

wirejock

Well Known Member
Living in the mountains, often there is no bucking partner around. Sweetie had to go out of town and Lucy needed her bottom aft fuselage skin riveted. The brain cells went to work so meet Homer Jr. Basically he is a hydraulic jack on a furniture dolly holding a back rivet bucking bar. The video should explain better.
Ready, set, action!
https://vimeo.com/124638167

Homer Sr. Is my camera tripod witb a Home Depot Homer bucket on top. He helps me by holding long skins from drooping off the dimpling bench. When his head is off, he holds my shop light and hose with regulator. Yea, I'm working to long alone in the shop!
 
Pretty slick - what do the say about necessity..? I see you're all set if you have to make an emergency call from the shop:D
 
Larry...aka MacGyver:D. Nice setup and kudos to you for using your noodle to figure out something cool like that!
 
Neat idea!
You could also use rivet tape to hold the rivet in place. That way you could load a few rivets and just have to move the bucking bar to the next rivet.
 
Is that 4x4 wood block oak or some hardwood? It appears to be oak. It probably wouldn't make any difference, but down here in the south a lot of wood in the shop is pine, which is soft. Just asking...
 
Wood block

First thanks to all for the comments.
Next answer a couple questions.
1. Rivet tape. Yes, good idea and I considered it. The problem is getting Homer Jr under the right rivet. I wasn't confident enough and even used a piece of tape with an arrow so I wouldn't miss.
2. Wood block. It's just scrap 4"x4" treated pine. Any block would do. There isn't much impact on #3 rivets. In fact, the rig was so solid, I turned the Sioux 3x down to about 18 psi and maybe a 1 second burst to set the rivet. It was built with stuff on hand. The only thing I bought was deck screws because I ran out. I'm cheap. Every trip to Home Depot, I always check the culled lumber pile.
 
Great solution

I was wondering how much flex there is in the setup.

With no flex it would be the same as table back riveting, but with the possibility of having clecos in place.

I also guess that since the bucking bar is guarantied to be normal to the skin there is no possibility of getting dings.

I am nearly tempted of using the method even with an inexperienced helper, their mission will be to uncleco, rivet in and positioning Homer Jr.
 
Positioning

I was wondering how much flex there is in the setup.

With no flex it would be the same as table back riveting, but with the possibility of having clecos in place.

I also guess that since the bucking bar is guarantied to be normal to the skin there is no possibility of getting dings.

I am nearly tempted of using the method even with an inexperienced helper, their mission will be to uncleco, rivet in and positioning Homer Jr.

It was surprisingly solid.
The positioning is the tricky part because the bottom skin is not razor straight. It slopes fore, aft and toward center. I sanded the bottom of the block about 1-2 degrees toward one corner. The bevel on the block allowed me to rotate the jack plate and block as needed to get the bucking bar face perfectly flat the the skin.
Once it's oriented raise the jack very slowly till it touches then just a hair more. You can see the fuse move about 1/64" or so up. That's the spot where you drive the rivet. Perfect back riveted skin.
No dings. Well, actually one. My phone rang and I got distracted and didn't get Homer Jr in the right spot. Doh! :eek:
 
With no flex it would be the same as table back riveting, but with the possibility of having clecos in place.

Taking nothing away from Larry's method, I clecoed from the inside and used a traditional back riveting setup and it worked fine
a9b7de222f6c5de61a21db29559d4cec.jpg


61fbb35fee6d22010d16dd1ac0bcbd8d.jpg


The corners took a while to get things balanced correctly and to ensure I was square to the plate

3cb747e0e0f61b98a643e5f01d53a8f1.jpg


f27c89d07b3405f58182c02177a20f93.jpg


It all went well with no dings whatsoever
e4729be37d86497a58dac3eb8077e706.jpg
 
Taking nothing away from Larry's method, I clecoed from the inside and used a traditional back riveting setup and it worked fine
a9b7de222f6c5de61a21db29559d4cec.jpg


61fbb35fee6d22010d16dd1ac0bcbd8d.jpg


The corners took a while to get things balanced correctly and to ensure I was square to the plate

3cb747e0e0f61b98a643e5f01d53a8f1.jpg


f27c89d07b3405f58182c02177a20f93.jpg


It all went well with no dings whatsoever
e4729be37d86497a58dac3eb8077e706.jpg

How long did that take? if we can skin a wing in five hours I bet that would have gone together in less than three.
 
Definitely took longer solo, but not too bad. Slows down a bit with the second side skin as the access is tighter. The corners (side to bottom skin) took the longest - balancing the tailcone just right to make sure the rivet is flush against the plate.
 
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