SB 14-01-31 Complete, Horizontal Stab Complete! Also rudder dissassembly & deburring

With the girls in Texas herding cattle, I got two long days in on the plane. First up: riveting the horizontal stabilizer.

I'm a slow learner, but after scuffing the front spar repeatedly I realized I could put some scrap cardboard & tape to good use (above, prior to re-taping). The cardboard also served to position the bucking bar centered on the shop head, lessening both my workload and mistakes.

All in all, I only drilled out about half a dozen rivets, and was able to do so without damaging the parts or enlarging any holes. After banging/bucking the forward spar & rib rivets by myself, squeezing the rivets along the edges was a piece of cake.

Soldiers all in a row...

I had to modify (with the consent of Van's Aircraft) the SB forward flange on the left rib, mounting inboard instead of the prescribed outboard placement. Previously it interfered with two of the rivets holding on the new doubler plate, but offsetting to the inboard side eliminated the clearance problem.

Here's a view of the forward side of the doubler plates & reinforcement angles in the middle of the HS. SB 14-01-31 is complete.

Fastest looking workbench I've ever seen...Feels good to see pieces take shape.

While waiting for HS & SB parts this spring I had started on the Rudder construction, proceeding as far as match-drilling all skin holes except the trailing edge. I overcame my nerves and used an angle template like we'd practiced in the SportAir Workshop, drilling half of the holes from each side. This will help the double-flush rivets set properly.

Next I trimmed, fitted & match-drilled the rudder horn brace.

As Van's tries to wean builders off the manual, forcing us to think (and read the prints) for ourselves, I noticed that match drilling the skin-to-horn brace wasn't mentioned. Boom.

Next I fabricated, deburred, clamped and match-drilled the rudder bottom attachment flanges.

One

And two. Time to disassemble & deburr!

On Sunday my buddy Brian from work stopped by to help, so he got stuck removing vinyl & stickers and deburring holes in the skeleton while I deburred the skins. If he comes back after this he must be hooked...

We finished the day by dimpling the 3/32" holes in the skins.

 

Empennage: 12 hrs