Footbox Panel Rivet Question

[SirAustin]

I am drilling out all my holes for my foot boxes and wondering if I am supposed to rivet into the small round tube that’s on the outboard side of the box.

58265827

I have enough room to rivet these panels together without going into the steel tubing but also line up perfectly to rivet them onto the round tubing.

[Gloveman]

I just finished riveting my cockpit aluminum this afternoon. I did not rivet to the tube you have asked about.

I will not distort the panel to make it fit. If the panel should obviously connect to something and it will not without distortion, I will re-work the panel.

Not sure if this is correct, just the way I do it.

[CDXXVII]

On the other forum I have found guys that have applied rivets through to the round tube and some that have not. The manual makes no mention of this. I have three holes drilled that ended up through the outer panels into the steel tube. Apon further inspection I descovered that it will be difficult to pull the sheet metal into the steel tube with out distorting the sheet metal. I an not sure how I am going to handle the holes I already made. Spacers perhaps but I do plan on not riveting to the steel tubes for the rest of the rivets in the drivers side footbox. I hope the outside panel is not visible with the body on. I am spending way too much time making my rivets look clean and having a few not look right is bothering me.

On another note. I did want to rivet to the round tubes in the footbox but nothing lines up without gaps. I ended up making a pan to fit inside the floor of the footbox that will allow me to revet the pan to all the frame members around it and then rivet the floor to the pan. I think this will make everything solid.

Thoughts?

5830

[CDXXVII]

Here is what the FFR tech. has to say on this subject. This also addresses the fact that I actually started to drill into the round tube. Only three holes but %$^#@@ anyways.
" For the footbox, the aluminum is only suppose to attach to itself and not the round tube. If you have already drilled into the round tube, than using a spacer and a longer rivet is acceptable. "

Hope this helps

[Pierre B]

On my MKII, I did not rivet into the round footbox tubes. Having that joint open allowed me to slip in sound deadening andcarpeting in a way I could not have done had that lap been riveted. Were I doing that task now, I would do the same thing as I did originally.

[SirAustin]

The round tube sits right where my rivets want to go so I reveted towards the outside of the car in this spots. Only way I could rivet them with out hitting the tube.