Positively Riveting: Crank it Up?
Why increasing air pressure doesn’t fix performance—and often makes it worse.
Michelle Donath, Positively Riveting
Anytime I hear someone say,
“Just turn up the air,”
I already know we’re about to make this worse.
Most people think increasing air pressure makes the tool more powerful.
It doesn’t.
What it does is wear things out faster.
Seals fail sooner.
Internal components take more impact than they were designed for.
And eventually, fluid starts showing up where it shouldn’t.
Now you’ve got a mess.
Here’s the tricky part:
Sometimes it feels like it helped.
The tool gets louder.
It feels more aggressive.
There’s more movement in your hand.
So the assumption is:
“Now we’re getting somewhere.”
You’re not.
Because this isn’t about air pressure.
It’s about traction power.
It’s not how fast the tool moves—
it’s how well it holds and pulls.
And turning up the air doesn’t improve that.
It doesn’t change the stroke.
What it can do is start taking stroke away.
It’s getting weaker.
So you end up in a cycle:
Something feels off → turn up the air
Performance drops → turn it up again
Meanwhile, you probably had something simple:
Basic wear.
Low fluid.
Routine maintenance.
Five-minute problems.
Now you’re past adjustment.
Now you’re into a rebuild…now, you fish out o-rings.
It feels logical.
If pressure is low, increase it.
If something feels slow, push harder.
Most systems respond to that.
This one doesn’t.
A rivet tool has a limit.
It can only do what it was designed to do.
It’s like pouring coffee into a full cup.
At some point, you’re not adding anything—
you’re just making a mess.
That’s what over-pressuring a tool does.
And if you keep going?
It shows up everywhere.
Fluid where it shouldn’t be.
Extra cleanup.
Unplanned downtime.
Now it’s not just a tool issue.
It’s a production issue.
Here’s the part that matters:
If you feel like you need to crank up the air,
you’re usually compensating for something else.
That’s the signal.
Not to increase pressure—
but to stop and look closer.
Because when you understand that:
You stop chasing the wrong problem.
You stop damaging good tools.
You stop turning small issues into expensive ones.
And that’s the difference between
keeping a line running
and actually fixing it.
More air doesn’t fix the problem.
It just hides it—until it gets expensive.
-MD
About the Author
Michelle Donath is the founder of Positively Riveting, specializing in blind riveting training,
troubleshooting, and process support. She works with manufacturers to identify root cause
across tools, fasteners, and application—not just symptoms.
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