Riveted Steel Hulls

Before welding technology progressed enough to make steel hulls, they were riveted. How did they keep the joints from leaking?

 

When you have two plates that are to be riveted, they would have drilled the holes at the same time, then reamed them so the holes were as close as possible. The reason is that if there is any slop in the holes, if there is a series of rivets, then it is possible that a single rivet will take more than its share of the load and fail, starting a domino effect.

The rivet would be placed in a hearth/oven, heated red hot, the pushed into the hole. A person would hold the backing hammer, actually a steel sledge that had a convex dome the same as the rivet head and the other person would manually or pneumatically hammer the flat side of the rivet to 1) completely fill the shank area in the plates (for the reason explained above and 2) to mate both heads to both plates. When the rivet cooled, the contraction would pull the plates together to make a tight fit.

From an engineering standpoint for shear between two plates, the compression effect of the contraction made the joint actually stronger than what a single uncontracted rivet could provide as the pressure between the plates actually increased the friction between the plate.

 

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From: Indira Gandhi National Open University

PDF's ---> Unit 1 -- Unit 2 -- Unit 3 -- Unit 4 -- Unit 5 -- Unit 6 -- Unit 7

Search the above PDF ‘‘Unit 3’’ for the word ‘‘caulk’’ and read the spacious area for your answer.

The word ‘‘caulk’’ is mentioned 12 times in the PDF ‘‘Unit 3’’.

Note also the meaning of the word ‘‘caulk’’ in the riveting context at the Key Words section.

Search the above PDF ‘‘Unit 3’’ also for the word ‘‘hot’’, and also read the spacious area there for your answer.

The word ‘‘hot’’ is mentioned 3 times in the PDF ‘‘Unit 3’’.

Below a small quote from the PDF ‘‘Unit 3’’, containing the word ‘‘caulk’’ 2 times as ‘‘caulking’’, and containing the word ‘‘hot’’ 3 times.
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But this is also the reason ships like the Titanic sunk. The super cool water made the steel in the rivets fragile.

 

Thanks Guys, that cleared it up for me. I searched for an hour and couldn't find any information.
Angelique, The picture in the Unit 3 part made it perfectly clear. Thanks again.

 

It was poor rivet steel and poor workmanship that sank the Titanic...

--> Materials Today --> What really sank the Titanic?

--> In Weak Rivets, a Possible Key to Titanic’s Doom.

--> Did poor workmanship sink the Titanic? Physicist claims missing rivets were crucial to 'cascade' of events that sank liner.​

 

Rivetting reading.

 

*groan*

Chris

 

Now I'm confused, is it riveting or rivetting, or is the first pure British English and the second more common English around the world . .

P.S. - Oops, sorry for asking, just shoot through my mind, it also could be a typo, as the second wouldn't be a efficient use of the world wide available t's . .

 

Titanic: *groan* = ‘‘ make a low creaking or moaning sound when pressure or weight is applied. ’’

Chris: *groan* = ‘‘ make a deep inarticulate sound in response to pain or despair. ’’

Which one, or both ?

 

Hmmm....I'd say as a general rule, a word ending with "T", with a vowel before the "T", but another consonant before that vowel, not two vowels together, when "ed" or "er" or "ing" is suffixed, the "T" is doubled, as in flit-flitter-flitted-flitting, as against float-floated-floater-floating, but there may be exceptions.

 

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I've just checked, The New York Times and the Indira Gandhi National Open University seems to apply the exception . .

TNYT

IGNOU

 

You don't double the consonant unless the stress lands on the last syllable of a multi-syllable word - Edited, posited, riveted, inhabited.

 

It was a riveting conversation, then.

 

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Well if so, let's go back then to the OP and add a bit to our riveting conversation . .

Since in the old times people did not only listen to their stereos ^[0:37-1:21] but also seems to put their stuff on YouTube we can watch a bit of that...

Caulking and Flueing a 1913 two cylinder Rumely steam engine​

I was a llittle shocked by the boiler caulking part in the video since it doesn't seem to be compliant with an old comprehensive engineering book on this matter...

The Steam Engine, 2: A Treatise on Engines and Boilers ^{[spare link]} by Daniel Kinnear Clark.

See ---> page 705 ^{[spare link]} ---> page 706 ^{[spare link]}

Next some links and quotes about the difference between Caulking and Fullering...

MeChAn!zEr

An in between note:

In contrast with the firts picture in above link + quote, and the "3 of 8" link + quote below, next a special device for caulking rivet heads, instead of a caulking tool, for caulking the rivets itselves...

Cooperative Patent Classification: CPC Definition - Subclass B21J ---> B21J 15/48

See picture: "3 of 8"

RIVETS AND RIVETED JOINTS

John Oxley ---> Caulking Plate Edges