I have recently treated myself to a set of cleco pliers and clecos. There is a lot to be said for having the right tools for a job
I felt it was time that someone introduced these tools to forum members who have riveted trailers that need a lot of riveting work and/or might be working on them as a professional trailer remodeler.
For instance on a replacement vent that is riveted in place and you have a new vent with the same hole locations you just put in the little spring clamps around in the hole locations and it will pull and hold everything in place while you install the new rivets. Just use the pliers to quickly remove the clamp from the next hole location you want to rivet. That way you don't need to have a helper standing around constantly putting pressure onto the piece you are riveting in place such as a rib, wall, etc and it frees up both of your hands for using the rivet puller.
What they are is a miniature spring clamp made just for inserting into a drilled hole to clamp the materials tight against each other while keeping the edges of the holes perfectly aligned. You match the rivet hole size to the cleco size. The pliers are a universal fit. I was, during my working years, an aircraft riveter so I have really missed having these great little clamps for projects where I have a need to drill a series of holes for fasteners into layers of materials and have everything stay in perfect alignment which is what is required for rivet installation jobs. I will be using riveted together aluminum angle for my cabinet framing so I wanted to have the convenience and precision as well as the faster assembly time these miniature spring clamps will bring to my project.
This is the basic beginners set I purchased, it has both 1/8" and 3/16" clecos which are a match for the rivets I will be using. You can choose from a variety of sets that have different size clecos in varying quantities. Both Ebay and Amazon offer these.