tell me about rivets

[Bernie]

I wanted to restore some of my Corgi and Dinky toys so I bought a few newer ones to practice with. The Chinese-made cars are less expensive on Ebay so I thought they were the smart way to go. I intended to replace the original rivets with screws so that I could take the cars apart more easily the next time if I needed to. I don't care that much about resale or whether they appear original. The posts on these cars is very small and I decided on using M2 screws, but had many problems.

Sometimes I drilled crooked and broke out the side of the post, other times the thin bit flexed and the hole was too large to tap. Sometimes it never seemed I could get the hole deep enough for a 4mm screw (the smallest I could find). Most times my hand wobbled when tapping the threads and the screw wouldn't go in. I have determined that the job is too difficult with the tools I have and there's no room for a drill press in my small house.

So the alternative is rivets. How do they fasten? Some things I've read indicated that they were superglued in. I tried superglue on a Ferrari Berlinetta that still had a tight press fit on the posts, but could not get things to fit together tightly (the Ferrari body is split across the middle). Superglue also doesn't handle torsion very well and the bond is often easy to break. Why are there different size rivets and how do you know which size you need? Does anyone have a better method for attaching baseplates?

[RSSierra]

Hi

I use the following:

5/64" shank diameter x 1/4" long under the head mushroom head solid mild steel fully annealed rivets shape to BS641 table 3 see http://www.sapphireproducts.co.uk/641t3.htm @ £19.20/100.

I drill out the post with a 2mm drill and fix the rivet with two part.epoxy.

Price above is from 2011 so may have changed. I'm just about to reorder and will probably get 200 plus this time.

Cheers

Dave

[Tinman]

I'm not aware of anyone trying to tap the hole, the most common method is to use a small self tapping screw (commonly called train screws in the USA). I buy my drill bits from a fastener supply house and get ten of them at a time. As soon as one get's dull (starts to cut slowly), I toss it and use a new one. The bit has to cut well without putting extra pressure on the work piece. As soon as you have to "push" the bit to do its job, that's when trouble starts.

I learned my lesson with super glue an long time ago and seldom use it. The fumes from the glue will damage paint finishes and ruin window plastic. As you say, it has trouble making a bond where there is less than perfect conditions.

[Bernie]

I'm not aware of anyone trying to tap the hole, the most common method is to use a small self tapping screw (commonly called train screws in the USA). I buy my drill bits from a fastener supply house and get ten of them at a time. As soon as one get's dull (starts to cut slowly), I toss it and use a new one. The bit has to cut well without putting extra pressure on the work piece. As soon as you have to "push" the bit to do its job, that's when trouble starts.

I've never heard the term "train screw" and I live in the US. I'll do some searching around the web and see what I can come up with. Do you know what size you use? #2? #3?, Metric? Can you reveal where you get the drill bits? None of the home improvement stores stock anything smaller than 1/16", which I've found to be too big during my attempts. Amazon seems to only sell sets, and I couldn't find anywhere that offered single sizes in bulk.

[Tinman]

Walthers sells all manner of screws and hardware on line or from their catalog. I don't know what size screws I commonly use. I unbag them and dump them into an organizer. When I need more, I just go down to my hobby shop and get them off the rack. Next time I go, I try to remember to post the sizes before I toss the packaging. My hobby shop usually gets them from Walthers. I could get these from the fastener supply, but I would have to buy at least 100 at a time.

Home improvement stores usually sell Dremmel accessories, you should be able to find small bits with the rest of the Dremmel stuff (although they may not sell them individually). I go to a commerical hardware supplier that sells all manner of fasteners. There's at least three of these supply houses in my town and none of them is a chain (AFAIK). House of Threads is the closest one (sounds more like a clothing store) and the place I frequent the most.

[Tinman]

I've never heard the term "train screw" and I live in the US.

Go to a real hobby shop (not a chain store) or a model railroad shop that sells scratch building supplies.

[Bernie]

I'd welcome some more input on this. Tinman feels he's lucky that he doesn't have to buy these 100 at a time but I'm not finding any in order quantities of less than 10,000 and I can't find any shorter than 1/4", which I feel would be too long. I tried the hobby shop but their train screws are brass and not self-tapping. Brass is softer than Zamac so they wouldn't cut any threads anyway. Since I've pretty much hit a dead end on screws, some information on making rivets work might be helpful.

[Tinman]

I guessing you didn't find the Walthers online catalog. Here's a link to pages and pages of screws/fasteners.

https://www.walthers.com/exec/search?qu ... &x=16&y=15

[Bernie]

Directing me to a website with 191 choices in screws is damn little help. As you stated that yours were self-tapping, and I only saw two choices identified as such, are there the ones that you use?
https://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/947-1189

[Tinman]

The ones I use for matchbox models are 2mm x 4mm self taping (although they might be sold in inch sizing which is easy enough to cross reference). Get out your caliper and determine which size will best suit the task. If you can't find a local supplier, you will have to get them on the web and it might be a trial and error thing until you get the right size. Not all of those screws are machine thread and most sheet metal screws will also work as self taping if you drill the right size hole. If your background or experience does no lend easily to machine type work, then you might be better off using epoxy.

Once you determine the size screw you want, depending on the supplier, you might have to buy a box of 100. However, in that quantity they will be cheap enough. I know there are large and small Corgi models and I don't know which you are working on nor do I work on Corgi, so I can't just tell you to get this or that and/or do this or that. I had to do some trial and error stuff to get to the point where I am with regard to restorations and the more you experiment, the easier it will all become.