My sons and I are member of Makerspace. We have not done any welding. My oldest son is heading back to college and we will be towing a small trailer. We built wooden sides and a top for the trailer. The top is attached to the sides with metal “L” brackets from underneath. There is a bolt going through the bracket from the bottom and through the wooden top and fastened with a washer and nut on top. We need to weld the bolt to the bracket to prevent it from falling out and also to prevent it from spinning since we can’t access it with the wooden top on. We have 10 of these brackets and bolts. My son leaves for school Friday morning.
Is there anyone that could help us to do a quick weld on these brackets and bolts? Nothing fancy. Just something to hold it in place when tightening the nut and MOST importantly, when removing the nut.
No, I need to keep the bolt from spinning when tightening and removing the nut. Locktite might work if there were threads but this is a bolt through the hole in the L bracket.
I confess to being uninformed when it comes to metal. Brazing (if it structurally unites the bolt and L bracket) is fine. There will be no more force than tightening the bolt. While I should have used galvanized parts since they will be exposed to the weather I didn’t. Only use the trailer occasionally.
Yes, at first I thought about a rivet nut but I see two problems. First, what would keep the rivet nut from spinning. Second, the plywood top sits flat and flush on the top of the L bracket. I thought about using nuts to hold the bolt in place but then the plywood top would not sit flush to the L bracket.
You would drill through the angle iron. A 3/8 rivet nut takes a 17/32 hole. Set the rivet. The rivet sets damn near flush. I have used them a lot in the past.
You set the rivet with a tool. I have used a variety of different styles of tools. I have used the old bolt with double nut, a pulley installer(it has a bearing on it) & two pieces of plate with a few holes drilled in them. I used to use them for putting rivet nuts in frames of Jeeps then mounting rock rails on them. The two pieces of plate is just two threaded holes then a hole large enough for a 3/8 bolt. The second piece has just one hole in the center that the 3/8 bolt goes through into the rivet nut. You then tighten the two bolts in the top plate to set it. You have to do it evenly though.
Rivnuts in the proper size hole expand are very tight. Lube it with loctite on install and you’ll have better grip. They are often installed “wet” on aircraft to water proof the hole. The excess squeezes out.