Just thought I'd share some piccies of my weekend project, as I'd noticed that some of the pop rivets were starting to fail on the wheel arch protector trims on my roadster. There are 20 rivets holding 4 pieces of trim on, one of each wheel arch. Looking at the design of the pop rivets used, they are quite unusual, in that they have "legs" which splay out quite widely behind the panel. These legs then corrode and fall off, at which point the pop rivet has failed and falls off. Having removed and replaced all 20 of these rivets, in fact only 6 of them had failed completely, which were all the lower ones on the rear wheel arches. The rivets on the front wheel arches were weak looking, but mostly intact, as were the upper group of 3 rivets on each of the rear trim parts.
This image is of the rear wheel arch, the three rivets that are still in situ were quite corroded but intact, and the 3 that are missing came off in my hand, as soon as I looked at them. The same 3 on the other side had long since gone unfortunately.
These images are of the rivets, and the new normal pop-rivets I used to replace them:
Using normal pop rivets does not spread the load as well as the original ones, so I used small M4 stainless steel washers on the 4mm pop rivets, placed on the rivet behind the panel, to ensure that the new pop rivets did not pull through and damage the carbon fibre. The new pop rivets won't corrode and fail in the same way, as they don't have the spindly legs of the originals. Fitting the new rivets with 4mm washers to protect the carbon fibre panel is fiddly, especially on the rear wheel arches, where I used a telescopic magnet to hold them steady whilst I popped the rivets. Patience is required here!
Also needed is some 3M tape, to stick the trims flush on the wheel arch. I also used a bit of tape to hold the rear wheel arch top "closed". As you can see in this image, without the tape in place the top fitted trim is quite baggy, and is an open invite to mud and crud. I closed that bagginess with a run of 3M tape across the top of the gap.
parts needed:
4mm countersunk pop rivets (I used ones with quite a long shank on them, to ensure that they sat properly behind the panel, and did not damage the panel)
4mm stainless washers
4mm black nylon finishing washers (of the 20 originals, 3 had entirely fallen off, so I was able to re-use 17 of them, and bought 3 from ebay, not a perfect match but you wouldn't spot the difference)
narrow 3M tape.
cheers
Drew
This image is of the rear wheel arch, the three rivets that are still in situ were quite corroded but intact, and the 3 that are missing came off in my hand, as soon as I looked at them. The same 3 on the other side had long since gone unfortunately.
These images are of the rivets, and the new normal pop-rivets I used to replace them:
Using normal pop rivets does not spread the load as well as the original ones, so I used small M4 stainless steel washers on the 4mm pop rivets, placed on the rivet behind the panel, to ensure that the new pop rivets did not pull through and damage the carbon fibre. The new pop rivets won't corrode and fail in the same way, as they don't have the spindly legs of the originals. Fitting the new rivets with 4mm washers to protect the carbon fibre panel is fiddly, especially on the rear wheel arches, where I used a telescopic magnet to hold them steady whilst I popped the rivets. Patience is required here!
Also needed is some 3M tape, to stick the trims flush on the wheel arch. I also used a bit of tape to hold the rear wheel arch top "closed". As you can see in this image, without the tape in place the top fitted trim is quite baggy, and is an open invite to mud and crud. I closed that bagginess with a run of 3M tape across the top of the gap.
parts needed:
4mm countersunk pop rivets (I used ones with quite a long shank on them, to ensure that they sat properly behind the panel, and did not damage the panel)
4mm stainless washers
4mm black nylon finishing washers (of the 20 originals, 3 had entirely fallen off, so I was able to re-use 17 of them, and bought 3 from ebay, not a perfect match but you wouldn't spot the difference)
narrow 3M tape.
cheers
Drew
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