Hey Andy,
Hopefully you don't mind me piggy backing your thread rather than starting my own similar one.
I stuffed various drill bits into the holes left by the rivets on my bus until I found the closest match. 9/32" is the diameter and that is not a common size. Since I'm going to be skinning over 80% of my windows plus re skinning the interior I need to find a solution.
First off - I can't find anywhere that has 9/16" dia x ~3/8" steel blind (pop) rivets locally. I'd rather not use 1/4" because surely there will be movement or moisture problems. I don't want to buy solid rivets and need to buck a thousand of them in. There are quite a few places that truly require the blind rivets as you cannot get to the other side.
Second - my squeeze (pliers) style rivet installer tool only has a hole so big to fit the nail end of a rivet so I doubt 9/32 rivets would fit in it even if I found some unless they had really thin nails.
Third - from what I have seen - these rivets cost an arm and a leg. By the time I factor shipping and exchange rate - I'm probably looking at $0.35 a rivet and waiting a bunch of time for them to arrive!
Hell that's like $350 in rivets?!
I know I read a thread after an exhaustive search that Nat used 1/4" bolts as hardware and that it was cheaper for him to do that rather than rivets. I might go this route but need blind rivets still for the blind holes.
Hopefully someone can help with quality suggestions?
Thanks!