Neat rivet trick you may or may not have figured out!

[gregor2727]

Big guy with bad eyes here. I knew I’d be having trouble with the little 0.7mm rivets, but hey, we all need vias. Although I got fairly good at it, I’m always looking for improvements, and noticed this fun fact:

FUN FACT: The little cleaning needles that come with 0.4mm FDM printer nozzles are the same ID as the rivets.

SO: You can thread a bunch of rivets onto a needle, then poke the needle into the little 0.7mm hole, use a tweezers to seat the rivet, and just move on to the next! I did 10 vias in 30 seconds.

PLUS: The needle tip pokes debris (conductive ink, FOD, etc) out of the hole as you align it!

[Rocksetta]

@gregor2727 I should have read your post!

@TSS_Bill @jazozaya

My trick, which is basically the same but for the bigger rivets. I was dreading doing my first board with rivets, since I can barely pick them up with tweezers without sending them across the room.

So a 22AWG breadboard wire was lying around so I trimmed it down and tried it with one rivet and it was so fast. Just picking the rivets up with a wire is worth the trick, but as you said being able to push through the hole that might be tight is a bonus.