skinning exterior

[carneiro1292]

ok so i saw this on this site and was wondering. ive never welded before, ive never used a rivet gun, just changed my oil for the first time a few weeks ago just to give you an idea to how naive and ignorant i am to all of this. i saw this picture and was wondering if you guys would agree to do it? would you guys reskin the whole exterior of your bus?



now my question is what the hell is he riveting into?
#1 on the top circle what the point of thse rivets? its hard to see but there are rivets all the way across the top of those panels from front to back. they arent riveting into anything else other than tht singlular panel. theres no overlap of another panel, its not riveted into the original yellow roof skin. so whats the point in riveting the entire upper part? im assuming im missing something but what?

#2 ok now the bottom circle, again what is he riveting into? i would understand if he riveted a few inches up or down from where he did with an overlap of both panels to squeeze the together, but whats the point in riveting in between the joints of two panels? they arent overlapping so they arent being closed together, ijust doont get?

again im only asking because i dont know and being tht im going o be doing something similar i figured i should prob find out.

this is another picture from the inside of the same bus


#1 again where are those top rivets going into to? whats threr purpose? i dont think theyre bringing two pieces of metal together they r just riveted into one panel so i dont get what tht does?
#2 again just to show you where those rivets are? this makes zero sense to me cause wtf are they joining togethere? i would thing the pannels would have to overlap inorder to rivet them together. would does this do? does it still work?
#3 i guess i just thought you rivet the panels to the frame of the bus to secure it to the bus, now i realise tht kind of seems silly. so do you rivet the pannels together, and then weld the panels to the frame to secure it directly to the bus? is this ow his works? again i just assumed you rivetes the panels directly into the vertical window frame like you see in the picture. im assuming im wrong bus again any info would be great thanks yous and sorry for the loong post

[Tango]

From a purely structural standpoint, the lack of horizontal bracing gives me the willies. A really bad idea in my book. And as you noted...nothing to tie the skin to along those lines.

[Peasant Racing]

Originally Posted by Tango

From a purely structural standpoint, the lack of horizontal bracing gives me the willies. A really bad idea in my book. And as you noted...nothing to tie the skin to along those lines.

I was thinking the same thing.

[carneiro1292]

ok but does one rivet through the panels into the frame(doesnt make sense to me as i dont see how thts possible) or do you rivet the skins together to one another and then weld onto ur bus frame? does tht make sense? also on circle#2 on the second picture what purpose do those rivets have? is tht how you do tht? personally it makes no sense i always thought you had to overlap the panels and rivet them together, other wise what job is it doing other than making a ton of holes in the sheet metal?

[Tango]

The original sheet metal on all the Skoolies I have ever seen included the majority of the side skins riveted to the ribs and horizontal bracing.

[buslife4all]

Originally Posted by Tango

From a purely structural standpoint, the lack of horizontal bracing gives me the willies. A really bad idea in my book. And as you noted...nothing to tie the skin to along those lines.

I am with you. I did build a frame around the exterior of a bus out of 1" square tube and laid sheet metal over it. Leaving the existing walls in place. You would never know it was a school bus from the exterior and it was easily done.

Oh and Hey, new guy here!

[family wagon]

In the interior photo, circle number 1, the dark spots in the zig-zag pattern are the back side of the rivets seen in circle 1 on the outside. They're in the lower portion of a C-shaped member that spans between each hat channel/frame rib/roof bow.

The light reflecting on the unpainted metal makes a lot of glare, but it looks to me as if that unpainted metal is lapped up under the roof metal so that the rivets in circles #1 are solid bucked rivets going through the roof metal, side metal, and C-shaped channel so that the two pieces of sheet are fastened to the space frame. I think that yellow band is the lower edge of the sheets that wrap all the way over the roof. It looks like the over-window eyebrows have been cut off.

#2 - I don't think those are rivets. I think they're tack welds lap or butt joining two pieces of sheet together. Probably the intent was to fully weld the joint but it hadn't been done yet at time of the photo.

The exterior sheet is often secured to the frame with rivets rather than welds because the parts are likely galvanized and welding would burn that off. Also riveted joints might be less prone to fatigue and cracking as the bus wiggles and flexes?

Agreed that some horizontal fill, a C-channel or something, would be a good idea around that line of (welds? rivets?) in the #2 circle.

Back to one of the earliest questions: yes I'm reskinning the exterior of mine (walls only, not roof). It better happen in the next few weeks because the bus has to be out of the shop where it has sat for nearly a year very soon!