Brief Description: Riveted Top Skin longeron rivets
My rivet buddy called and said he was available to help me rive, we were able to nearly finish riveting on the top skin. There are 4 rivets that I just can’t buck due to wire bundles in the way; they are the ones that sit between the aft baggage wall and the bulkhead just aft of there. I will buy the small head CR3214 4-04 rivets to go there. I also had an issue with the rivet size called out in the plans. The plans call for you to use a 3-6 along the longeron holes but there are a few rivets that go thru the longeron and a gusset attached to the F804 bulkhead. A 3-8 was too long so I cut a bit off the 3-8 and this worked (not 3-7 in the kit). There is one rivet that is called out in the plans to be a 3-8, it is the one just on the forward side of the F804 bulkhead and has the tab from the bulkhead rib. This is too short and I need a 3-9 which I don’t have on hand, so these holes will have to wait until I can pick up some 3-9 rivets. The good part is I can reach to rivet and buck this myself.
The big rivets that go on the forward left side are tough to get to since you have to reach across the open baggage bay, also the shop head from the upper line of rivets makes getting the bucking bar on them a little tough. These are the larger 4-7 rivets. We manage to get them all set but upon inspection the skin is not laying down tight under these rivets. I dread drilling these out but I think I will. I plan to order the correct size Cherry rivets and install those; it will be much easier and pull things up tighter. The Cherry Max pulled rivet is an allowed substitute for the solid rivets, they don’t get used many places on airplanes because they cost nearly a dollar each, but I only need 7.
Me with the back rivet set, most can be done with this method, others get bucked.
