Wanted: Bren carrier rivets

[Francis Lafrance]

Where to find the rivet for bren carrier armour??

[RichardT10829]

SAPPHIRE PRODUCTS Birmingham United Kingdom.

If you drop me an email, I will give you some details that will make ordering them easier. There are others who need rivets for carrier projects in Canada. If they have not yet already got them, they might shout up and you can split the postage.

I am happy if you order the rivets from the above firm to use my address as a holding station until you sort overseas postage, and can help package them up for the journey.

Finally (insert shameless plug)

I produce the tools required to form the rivets if you get stuck.


Cheers

Richie

[Lynn Eades]

Or, there is "Big flats rivet company" on the net, based in New York, and they ship to Canada.

[rob love]

If you know someone in Calgary there is a surplus store there that sells a very suitable rivet for $5 for each box of 20 or 25. I have done a few carriers using their rivets.

[Robin Craig]

If you can wait a bit there is a sea container coming from the UK later this year.

A box of rivets could easily go inside.

That would get you as far as Toronto

Robin

[Wayne Hingley]

Originally Posted by rob love

If you know someone in Calgary there is a surplus store there that sells a very suitable rivet for $5 for each box of 20 or 25. I have done a few carriers using their rivets.

I am in the Calgary area and would be happy to help out with getting rivets from the source Rob mentions.

[jeff davis]

A company called fastenal here in bc sells them reasonably cheep after all they are rivits

[Jim Burrill]

I need enough rivets for one side armour installation. Plus some extras to practice with.

Happy to buy a box o 50 or 100 if that what it takes.

Happy to work with anyone to get these.

Jim
Lansdale PA area.

[Lynn Eades]

Jim,my advice is buy them a bit too long, Do a test run, and cut them to suit. The clearance in the hole can use up material. Most U.C. rivets are 3/8", but the U.Cs use 5/16" rivets to join the track guards to the angle iron (the angle iron that meets the upper hull side plates.

Try that web site I mentioned. It is rivets that they do. Freight from there to here is expensive, but for you guys it's cheap! (relatively speaking)
Rivets tend to add up, weight wise.

Colin Jones gave me about 30+ kilos of 3/8" rivets, when Chris and I stayed at their home a couple of years ago. I carted them from Adelaide to Kalgoorlie on the train, and again when we came home, down to Perth on the train, and then on the plane to New Zealand. They had to be spread around in the luggage. The bag limit on Air N.Z. is 24 kilos. 30 kilos would pull the handles off of a lot of bags!
Thank you again Colin.

[jeff davis]

Google fastenall they are a huge distributor based in minisota you need 5/16 ri it's 1 inch long
Regards
Jeff

[jeff davis]

Fastenal
275 Avenue Saint-Sacrement #120
Quebec City
Closed now

[colin jones]

I still have quite a few rivets left but I think the postage would be quite expensive. I sent some M3 grousers to Canada and that was $800 so I would think it would be around $100 to send a few KGs but I'm happy to help if needed.
Colin.

[RichardT10829]

That's not quite correct, you actually need 3/8 rivets for the armour and 5/16 for the air intake boxes, radio battery box and some rivets in the folding armour on a Mk1

[maple_leaf_eh]

Didn't someone post a lesson in how to rivet a carrier? I recall the tricks was heat the blank rivet to a certain colour, then two men with the riveting tool and the backing tool did a sort of dance with tongs and hammers. Whoever wrote the story made it seem "effortless" but very tiring. The fellow said he tried using a C-clamp tool, but I forget whether it worked or not.

[jeff davis]

I Talked to a blacksmith and did this
Clamp armour put rivit though hole heat with torch smash end with hammer or air chisel with appropriate shaped head . Worked great

[RichardT10829]

Drill and prep all holes first,,,, bolt the plate on and check alignment, remove every other bolt and replace with a rivet... Allow to cool and repeat with the remaining bolts. Problem with using clamps is they vibrate loose and you end up with slack rivets or miss alignment issues, fine if your doing maybe one rivet, but not say an entire side plate on a carrier.

http://youtu.be/NKBXa9PaSZM

I have done a couple

[Lynn Eades]

I have done almost the entire carrier

[rob love]

The real trick that I have found is to get the right rivet gun. I recently did all the upper armour rivets on the 2PPCLI carrier here in Shilo. I bought a rivet gun at a farm auction a couple years ago and it turned out to be a 9X gun. I think those little cheapies you buy from Princess auto run around 2X or 3X.

The 9X will actually do the 1/4 or 5/16 rivets cold. For the 3/8 rivets, I bolt the armour on to start with, and remove one bolt at a time. I insert the rivet, and have a helper hold the rivet with a large bar on the inside of the carrier. Almost all the rivets go from inside to outside, with the exception of the rear rivets which go from outside to inside.

The large bucking bar is a 20" long piece of 2" round-stock with holes in it to match the dome of the new rivet. While the helper is holding it tight against the armour, I heat the rivet with a oxy-acetylene torch until it is red. I pass the torch off to the helper to hold, and hit the rivet with the 9x air hammer. They dome in about 8 hits, and it's done. If it is not quite perfect, then I'll heat it again, but in the single try, I get about 85% of them done.

I did the entire upper armour in less than two days and more likely closer to one. I think I had to remove maybe 3 rivets and do them a second time.

Some of the rivets at the division plate had to have the insides hammered flat due to interference with the rivet situated 90° from it.

My 9x gun uses the larger .498 bits, and some of the curved ones will break on you. I bought all those online from one of the aircraft suppliers, and they worked great.

This is the third or fourth carrier I have done, and by far the easiest. I'll credit the gun for the success.

[Bob Carriere]

Ottawa store, under instructions from head office Canada WILL NO longer sell you retail cash unless you have a company hame and CRS /Prov. Tax number. no amount of pleading works.
Individual collectors are not an important enough business for them.

NOW using First Call Automotive bolts supply (small local owner onsite ottawa based) who will order and obtain any of the old style slotted machine screws, four sided nuts form suppliers like PAPCO, Spaneour...... and get this at a lower overall retail price than Fastenal.

Bob C

[jeff davis]

Went to Maple Ridge store here in BC and same story .
Bunch of s...heads
Regards
Jeff

[colin jones]

What exactly do you need Jeff. I may be able to help.
Colin.

[jeff davis]

Just commenting thank you

[Wayne Hingley]

Francis: I picked up your rivets today at the surplus store in Calgary (as per Rob's advice above). I will get them to you next week when I am in Qc.

Jim Burrill: I have yours too and will send them out via Canada Post.

[rob love]

I hope you didn't clean them out Wayne?

[Wayne Hingley]

Ha... there are still a few left for your next project Rob. I would estimate that they still have between 300 & 500 left. Unless there are more buried in the pile. I actually grabbed a box of "aircraft rivets" that look to be just about right for fastening data plates.