Rivets

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The reason I mentioned was that after painting whole airframe with a relatively thick layers of paint which became stiff sometime later, and some of the rivet heads on the main spar at the wing root on the upper and the lower surface looked so much loosened, at least to the eye of our inspector. So we had had those fasteners replaced by an aircraft company at its factory nearby. They replaced the existing fasteners, each consisted of an outer sleeve and a rivet core, with modern type fastener system.

You'll also find that "frame 6" (the bulkhead at the wing attach fittings) cracks at the top of the bulkhead on the angled portion of the bulkhead that is riveted to the top of the fuselage. Small cracks can be stop drilled, larger cracks require installation of a doubler.
 
The B-17 had button head rivits except for the leading edge which were countersunk. The Corsair fuselage was spot welded which makes it more time consuming to repair today, each spot weld has to be drilled out to disassemble and countersunk rivits used on reassembly. Pusuit planes had countersunk rivits except for areas that were covered by the wing fillets. If you look at a P-40 wing it is smooth except for the area the fuselage covers. FLYBOYJ, when you go to WestPac say Hey to Derek and Chris for me, it's been a few years.
 
Thanks. As an airframe mechanic I needed re-viewing the techniques from time to time but I really needed this when I took an examination in 1978.
 

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