If you were a rivet expert with 1000hrs and tons of rivets under you belt you could probably make due in theory, but it would be far from productive or repeatable... As I said above the key to almost all rivet guns is in there precision of power and trigger control.
Rivet guns come in 9 basic sizes each to fit a very specific range of rivet ( steel or aluminum ) 2-3x are comon smaller guns, 4-6x are more middle range guns, 7x-9x are the large guns once you get larger than that you get into rivet busters which are similar to a jack hammer of sorts
RRH04=3x RRH08=5x RRH12=7x
This should help you out a bit