Bill,

Surely TWO pairs of hands should allow you to do the rivetting AND scratch your nose at the same time?

Or you could get someone with one pair of hands to help you? Not very helpful. Sorry. Steam is not my thing so I don't know what's involved.

John

There is a riveting tool that squeezes the rivet and forms the head. Have a look in the archives on here or someone will come on and help with more info.

David

I found that if you use one of the snaps held vertically in the vice and arrange two suitable supports on the bench then the work almost becomes self supporting on the three points, supports only need be blocks of wood or stack of small boxes. You then rest the hand holding the second snap on the work to keep the factory rivit head in the vice mounted snap and the other usually right hand is free to do the hammering. I did my traction engine wheels, tender and hornplates like this where both sides are on show

If you have room to get a rivit squeezer in then Polly sell them complete or just the castings, there was also an article in an old ME and reproduced in one of the "best of" specials. These have been discussed several times for example

Don’t forget to anneal non ferrous and let down steel ones beforehand, makes life a lot easier!

Let down steel rivets? Can someone please explain this term to me? I thought that steel rivets were made of dead-mild steel which would not harden with age?

When stuck for an alternative, I have made rivets from ordinary woodworking nails – a lot of faffing around but it got the job done.

In difficult assembly situations would it work to hold the bits together with superglue at a few strategic points,then just rivet them together(for appearances sake)?

Chas

Bill, if you search for 'rivet squeezer' on the net, you will find several of them. Not cheap though.

Brian