HF Air Hydraulic Riveter

[Vortec_Cruiser]

Has anyone bought one of the HF riveters? If so, how well does it work, and how durable is it?

[D60]

I dunno about durable, but it works well enough. Most rivets require two "hits" to break the tab off. It looks identical to units that sell for much more, like Sunex or AP or something - can't recall exactly. It regularly goes on sale in stores, but stores rarely have more than a couple on hand.

[littlemeck]

I dont know about durability either I just bought the bigger one (goes up to 1/4") last weekend and have only done about 20 rivets but it work just as good as the HI $ one that I use at work

[hurleygo3]

they dont last never long and they are very weak. i have owned one and it lasted about a week. my snap on one is over a year old and still works great.

[Vortec_Cruiser]

they dont last never long and they are very weak. i have owned one and it lasted about a week. my snap on one is over a year old and still works great.

How can you even compare HF to Snap On? :shaking:

[groundloopdog]

I built an airplane with one pulled 1000+ ss rivets.I did have to take it a part and clean the inside and put new oil in it. it was a pita but it worked fine after that

[Brad]

We bought one of the HD aircraft whatever ones from HF for all the interior panels of dads facory five cobra, a ton of 1/8 and 3/16 rivets and it still works. The 1/8" ones work in one shot, the 3/16 require 2 pulls but it saves a TON of time(and saves your hands) compared to a manual one.

[ChiScouter]

Ive had one for around 5 years or so, well worth the money

[Aces'n'8s]

Ive had one for around 5 years or so, well worth the money

We may have the same one. I bought one about 5-6 years ago (it has the green hammered finish) and it's still going on strong. I'd say I've run about 2000-3500 rivets through it. The larger rivets do require double taps, but man, I couldn't imagine popping them by hand.

I did have to oil mine too.

[bgaidan]

Even if it barely works, it's a steal for the price. I had two hi dollar ones from mcmaster ($800 or so apiece) and pulled about 8000 3/16" 316 SS rivets between the two of them. Both had to have parts replaced at least twice during that time. And even those needed 2 pops most of the time for 3/16".

Sounds like these hold up about as well for about 1/12 the price.

[nissancrawler]

Guys at work use them them on planes with no problems. Our rivets aren't your standard pop rivet either. They will pull #6 (3/16) monel cherrymax rivets.

[littlemeck]

I am going to take back my earlier post. I just did about 30 1/4" rivets today w/ mine and it started leaking air from the exhaust port. I will squit some oil in it tommorow and if that don't work it is going back to HF.