Need a Air Rivet Tool for sickle mower repairs

[sweettractors]

So far, all I have found are too expensive or not big enough to handle a 3/16 diameter steelrivet. I have been watching Ebay with no luck. I have googled this tool and all I come up with are $400 Plus. More than I want to spend. Any leads on Used or new? Ken Sweet

 

[deereman75]

Do you mean one of those pneumatic POP rivet guns, or a rivetting hammer, kind of like an air hammer. If you mean the POP rivet type, I am sure harbor freight has one cheep. If you mean the kind like an air hammer, just try putting a rivetting point in your air hammer.

 

[zzvyb6]

You don't need an air tool to set a rivet in a sickle bar. All you need is a ball pein hammer and some practice. It takes less time, too.

Switch to nuts and bolts and you won't need any of it and you can fix the bar out in the field.

 

[bindian]

So far, all I have found are too expensive or not big enough to handle a 3/16 diameter steelrivet. I have been watching Ebay with no luck. I have googled this tool and all I come up with are $400 Plus. More than I want to spend. Any leads on Used or new? Ken Sweet

Ken,
If you don't want to do it the way zzvyb6 mentions above, go to the local airport and ask a mechanic if he can rivet some #6 steel rivets for you. Show the mechanic your rivet to be sure the rivet set will match or almost match the rivet. Bringing the pieces to rivet with you would be easier.

If you want to do it on an ongoing basis, you can just buy a #6 rivet set from any aircraft tool supply place online. It will be under $20. Get a big chunk of steel that can be positioned and held were the head of the rivet goes. Drill a hole in that chunk so the rivet set can fit. The rivet set is .401 in size. Then you can strike the shop head (the end you form) with a heavy ball peen.

Best way to do it is to place the chunk of steel with the rivet set in it on a solid flat surface. Position the rivet in the hole and place the work upside down on the rivet set and wack the rivet with a ball peen to form the shop head.

Or you can buy the set(s) need and a rivet gun. You will need a 4x or stronger gun. You can make your own bucking bars. But you need to heat treat them.
Bring extra rivets to practice with or for screwups. You can nail them over if they are too long.
Hope this helps.

Oh yeah. You might need a 9x rivet gun, depending on the steel rivet hardness. That rivet set takes a .498 inch hole.
hugs, Brandi

 

[RickB]

Or you can toss the rivets and use EZ-bolts.

 

[sweettractors]

Actually, we rebuild scores of sickle mowers per year and need a more effecient way to rivet the new sections in place. The C type riviter is what I thought I need. What I have found on Ebay have a limit on size of 3/32 diameter rivets. Ken Sweet

 

[Whatswrong]

Johnson sickle servicer isn't air but works well I tried CP their webb address but lost it.

 

[MHarryE]

Ken - I am trying to remember back to when I visited our sickle suppliers (Kondex and our own plant in Hamilton, Ontario) and I believe both used hydraulic squeezers. That was 20 years ago so my memory may be a bit off on that but there was the need for speed supplying tens of thousands of sickles per year, keeping noise down, and quality. Of course the type of machinery they were using was way out of the price range for a dealer's shop but I was thinking a Cee shaped unit with the proper punch and anvil hooked to a hydraulic source you might already have in the shop would work well and may not be cost prohibitive. Doing the same thing with air - shop working pressure for air is so low that a squeeze type rivet set would get to be very large to get enough force to form the head while oil hydraulics retains a reasonable size. In our R&D shop we set rivets for testing different sections by laying the sickles on the floor and using an air hammer with the right tool end but it was always noisy and the pneumatic hammer would never give the hgh quality rivet job of the hydraulic squeezer.

 

[bindian]

Actually, we rebuild scores of sickle mowers per year and need a more effecient way to rivet the new sections in place. The C type riviter is what I thought I need. What I have found on Ebay have a limit on size of 3/32 diameter rivets. Ken Sweet

Ken,
Oh, a pneumatic C squeeze. Awesome piece of equipment. $400 is a bargain buy if it has the capacity. Are the steel rivets soft or what. The steel rivets we use on aircraft are Monel and pretty hard. I have a hand operated C squeeze that costs a couple of hundred bucks. No way my hand squeezer could do steel rivets. You will also need flat sets and a set that fits your rivet head.
Look for rebuilt squeezers. Contact the aircraft tool supply outlets and let them know what you are doing and looking for.
hugs, Brandi

 

[bindian]

Ken - I am trying to remember back to when I visited our sickle suppliers (Kondex and our own plant in Hamilton, Ontario) and I believe both used hydraulic squeezers. That was 20 years ago so my memory may be a bit off on that but there was the need for speed supplying tens of thousands of sickles per year, keeping noise down, and quality. Of course the type of machinery they were using was way out of the price range for a dealer's shop but I was thinking a Cee shaped unit with the proper punch and anvil hooked to a hydraulic source you might already have in the shop would work well and may not be cost prohibitive. Doing the same thing with air - shop working pressure for air is so low that a squeeze type rivet set would get to be very large to get enough force to form the head while oil hydraulics retains a reasonable size. In our R&D shop we set rivets for testing different sections by laying the sickles on the floor and using an air hammer with the right tool end but it was always noisy and the pneumatic hammer would never give the hgh quality rivet job of the hydraulic squeezer.

Yeah, a port-a-power hand pump could be used. But then you would need two folks to operate it all.
hugs, , Brandi