A letter to the engineer who thought to use pop rivets to secure window regulators instead of bolts.

Dear engineer,

If I ever meet you, I will put a rivet through your balls.

Sincerely,

Anyone who has ever had to drill those f@#kers out.

It took nearly 4 hours to remove 4 window regulators using 2 drills and 4 batteries. And many bits. Hate them so much.

What type; solid, blind, drive...?

I had to replace the original factory ball joints on the B-59, and they were riveted in. Not too bad a procedure, but I had clear access.

Regardless, modern iron is not made for the driveway mechanic to work on, period.

You're lucky yours still has a dipstick.

DF: was it your Intrepid? If so, given the vintage, don't go near the engineers. Find the nearest bean counter and let 'em have it.

That is what I love about airtools, they have one that pops out those rivets mighty fast. I agree, the bean counters are too blame for this shortcut.

The vehicle in question is a `94 Crown Victoria, same applies for our `93 Grand Marquis, probably all Panther cars.

IIRC the Intrepid's are bolted in, and the Prizm's are. Changing the Prizm's regulator only took me 15 minutes the first time.

Mid '90s Ford? Yeah, still probably bean counting, unfortunately.

Ouchie...

Worst problem I have with drilling rivets is if they spin... if so, I'll either snap a vice grip on the outside ring or put a nick in the ring that I can stop the spinning with a flathead.

OTOH, putting these parts back in with nuts and bolts is a disaster. So I either use clip-on nuts on the part or weld nuts to the part.

Also, I wouldn't use a battery-powered drill... they don't last long enough. Since I assume this is on the parts car Panther, I would use a sharp chisel and BF Hammer. I've taken out rivets in the junkyard in 3-4 hits.

Titanium bits are helpful, and yeah, I use a corded drill for stuff like this.....