Rodmaster
Recruit
- Joined
- Jul 27, 2020
- Messages
- 2
Hey everyone,
My name is Paul. My 16 year old saved his money and purchased a 16 ft Sylvan Rodmaster, 70hp Mercury, and a trailer. It's already been gutted and we're going to begin restoring it. But there's a problem. I know less than zero about restoring a boat. If you would please stop laughing for a second, I'll explain.
I grew up fairly poor, but when I was 14 years old, my father came home with a '68 Mustang that he'd purchased for $500. It was a total basket case. Over the next 2 years my father and I worked on that car, and by the time I was 16 and ready to drive, I had the prettiest '68 Mustang you've ever seen. It's one of the fondest memories I have of my father who's been gone now for a little over a decade.
Fast forward to today, my son worked his tail off, saved his money and said "I want to buy a boat and restore it". He doesn't play video games and he's not on meth. How was I going to say "No" to that?
So here we are with a gutted 78-79'ish Sylvan Rodmaster that's in ok condition, but definitely needs some help.
Here's where we're at right now;
We've started wire brushing all of the old paint off, removing the rivets that can't be rebucked, and it seems I've hit a bit of a snag. I'm not certain as to what rivets to use. We purchased some 3/16" rivets, they fit in the holes a little loose.
I watched a couple of Youtube videos on using an air hammer (2 person job) to install the rivets that don't have a mandrel. It's not working so great. The air hammer, although I have a shaft that's shaped like the head of the rivet, it just seems to mark up the head of the rivet badly, and not clamp down as we'd like. So we're back to the drawing board.
I think the shaft of the rivet itself may be a little too long as well. So for my questions.
I see guys using closed end rivets with a mandral and a rivet too. It's my understanding that those shouldn't be used? Am I wrong? Becuase that seems a heck of a lot easier.
I purchased some G Flex to insert into the hole and around the rivet. If anyone can help with the right size and length of rivets I should be using, I would be eternally grateful. I'm seriously out of my element here, I've never worked with rivets before in my life.
Thanks
-Paul
My name is Paul. My 16 year old saved his money and purchased a 16 ft Sylvan Rodmaster, 70hp Mercury, and a trailer. It's already been gutted and we're going to begin restoring it. But there's a problem. I know less than zero about restoring a boat. If you would please stop laughing for a second, I'll explain.
I grew up fairly poor, but when I was 14 years old, my father came home with a '68 Mustang that he'd purchased for $500. It was a total basket case. Over the next 2 years my father and I worked on that car, and by the time I was 16 and ready to drive, I had the prettiest '68 Mustang you've ever seen. It's one of the fondest memories I have of my father who's been gone now for a little over a decade.
Fast forward to today, my son worked his tail off, saved his money and said "I want to buy a boat and restore it". He doesn't play video games and he's not on meth. How was I going to say "No" to that?
So here we are with a gutted 78-79'ish Sylvan Rodmaster that's in ok condition, but definitely needs some help.
Here's where we're at right now;
We've started wire brushing all of the old paint off, removing the rivets that can't be rebucked, and it seems I've hit a bit of a snag. I'm not certain as to what rivets to use. We purchased some 3/16" rivets, they fit in the holes a little loose.
I watched a couple of Youtube videos on using an air hammer (2 person job) to install the rivets that don't have a mandrel. It's not working so great. The air hammer, although I have a shaft that's shaped like the head of the rivet, it just seems to mark up the head of the rivet badly, and not clamp down as we'd like. So we're back to the drawing board.
I think the shaft of the rivet itself may be a little too long as well. So for my questions.
I see guys using closed end rivets with a mandral and a rivet too. It's my understanding that those shouldn't be used? Am I wrong? Becuase that seems a heck of a lot easier.
I purchased some G Flex to insert into the hole and around the rivet. If anyone can help with the right size and length of rivets I should be using, I would be eternally grateful. I'm seriously out of my element here, I've never worked with rivets before in my life.
Thanks
-Paul