Copper rivets on Bugatti dashboards?

[Mr. Don]

Hello, any metallurgists' out there? I do not have any Bugatti, but I do research all my projects, (future projects) as completely as possible.

Since Copper in direct contact with Aluminum is a big "No-no", why are there Copper rivets on the beautiful engine-turned dashboards?

Why would Bugatti use them and how have they faired? 

 

A friend has suggested that the actual surface seen might be Stainless Steel, and looking closely at some of the bulkhead edges, I may be seeing what I want to see? Another friend commented that the rivets look much like those used in making saddles! Which would fit in with E. Bugatti's love of horses, and also the family's interest in materials being used "Artistically." (Look at Carlo's furniture)

 

 

 

 

Edited January 5 by Mr. Don (see edit history)

[Mr. Don]

This is a detail that has not always been captured in models, but they are there, and in 1/4th scale they would definitely be visible.

[alsancle]

That is a good question.  I don't know but will guess:

 

1.  There is an insulation wafer we can't see.

 

2.  One of the two metals is not what it appears to be.

 

I have always loved the Type 35 Bugatti and my dad would tell the story of the Bird estate auction in the early 60s at what left of their estate Farnsworth.   A Type 35B supercharged with almost zero miles sold for 1500 bucks.

[Rusty_OToole]

If the car was under water the aluminum would corrode like crazy. As long as it is dry it may be ok. Maybe Bugatti didn't know this or didn't care. I doubt he thought his race cars would still be around this long.  Why didn't he  use aluminum rivets .

[Mr. Don]

Thanks guys, I agree with you both! An electrolyte being present would definitely make for a horrible join. Perhaps there is a "heavy" viscous insulator applied during assembly? Plastics weren't used, but a heavy varnish, shellack, or even tar? -and I'm sure no one was thinking that these cars would last as long as they have.

 

The question of "Why didn't he use aluminum rivets?" is coincidently, my next question.  

 

 

[Mr. Don]

With this view you can see possibly a "skinning of a second metal" on the face of the panel, perhaps Stainless? You can see some of the washers on the backside being used as you would with rivets.  And? maybe the Copper is itself a cladding over the top of the rivet?

 

Anyone out there have any experience with these cars?

[Walt G]

4 hours ago, alsancle said:

I have always loved the Type 35 Bugatti and my dad would tell the story of the Bird estate auction in the early 60s at what left of their estate Farnsworth.   A Type 35B supercharged with almost zero miles sold for 1500 bucks.

I have a envelope full of reports of the Bird estate auction in Oyster Bay NY that were in magazines at the time, plus a copy of the auction catalog with the prices written in and who bought and paid what when it happened. I was there ( although young - now am older/ish) and recall Austin Clark arriving to attend in his Silver Ghost RR limousine. Some amazing cars attending driven from all over - many classics . Grace Gluck did a good story on that auction for the Metro Region CCCA some time ago and I am working on ( but slowly) my remembrance of that auction for her even though I am no longer in CCCA .  Some amazing cars at that sale beyond the classics - several minty condition low mileage Buicks in the 1937 era. Tunick brothers car dealers of Ct. were there bidding/buying and making more noise then most people could tolerate.

I believe that Austin Clark did buy that type 35, and it sat in a storage building out at his museum in Southampton  NY for decades in the original condition he bought it in .  I used to crawl over it to get to stuff when Austin would have an "Iron Range Day" to sell parts and invited people there to look through stuff.  Those were the days......🙂

[Roadster Willy]

Doubt there is anything under the rivets. (I have been doing riveting, mostly aluminum, on aircraft, but also steel and brass riveting on steam locomotives) for nearly 50 years.  Probably nothing used to coat them either. prior to installation. I see no sign of any material around the edges of the rivets that are on the aluminum panel.  Electrolytic corrosion takes moisture to make it work. Hopefully your Bugatti was not going to be submerged at any time. It was either decorative, or the reason he used copper is that it is softer than aluminum, and thus would not deform the aluminum sheet during installation at the factory. But again, why not use aluminum rivets anyway?  Perhaps some Bugatti expert will chime in. Also, is there any trace of laquer or other finish coating on the panel? I can see that if they had a polished panel, with copper rivets, when they were done building it, they might have polished it up so it looked very pretty, and then sprayed it with clear lacquer, or French polished it, to give it a shiny, smooth look. 

[prewarnut]

Our house has a lot of copper and I added copper flashing to the tops of our shutters 7 years ago to protect the exposed tenons. I used (apparently) copper plated nails at a big box store driven into thick copper flashing I bought and bent up. On inspection last year the copper is intact but somehow some corrosion on the nails are evident now. As per this source, the copper usually remains protected but not the steel: https://copper.org/applications/plumbing/techcorner/pdf/galvanic_corrosion.pdf

[MikeC5]

Yup, just look at the 'galvanic series'.  I would guess, since Mr. Ettore was very much into making his mechanical marvels esthetically pleasing, that it was done just for that reason.