Category: Empennage

I didn’t take many pictures of the finishing process, but it took me quite a bit of time on Saturday to get it done. I got all of the front edges rolled first. Luckily, the tool that I saw on the internet worked really well. It was just a bedroom clothes hanger pole and some 7/8″ sockets epoxied to the inside. It worked really well and I bet I’ll be using this same tool quite a bit in the future with other rolled edges.

The front edge forming was actually easy to do but just time consuming. I luckily hit the predrilled hole in the counterbalance weight but that also was easier to do by drawing a line in-between the two screw holes and then splitting the difference in the length between them both and it was right smack dab in the middle of the pre-drilled hole. It turned out pretty good though!

Before all of the travel we had planned for the Mother’s Day weekend, I decided to button up the trailing edge of the rudder as well as get the spar riveted. I was able to use the squeezer for most of the spar, but there were a few places that I didn’t have enough depth to the yoke I’m currently using so I had to break out the rivet gun and bucking bar for those. I tried to use my trailing edge squeezer set but I tried it once and it was creating some odd looking rivets so I decided just to do the backriveting the way they explained it in the manual. There were a few places where I attempted to rivet it too much and created some circle indentions from the backrivet bottoming out against the rudder. I tried to keep that to a minimum but I kept trying to get my rivets perfectly flush instead of just enough. Either way, it was a long and tedious day but the rudder trailing edge looks awesome for my first time if I do say so myself!

I finally had enough contiguous time to get the rudder internal stiffeners and sheer clips riveted together and the trailing edge sealed. Now just to wait a few days for it to cure and I can finish the riveting and button this up finally!

I spent most of this weekend getting stuff put together on the rudder to make sure things lined up, etc. I noticed that the trailing edge of the rudder wasn’t super flat so I decided to follow the route that quite a few others have done which is to setup an angle iron jig. I got that done this weekend and now I have just a few small places where I think the counter sinking isn’t 100% but I’ll get that cleaned up here soon and get this thing closed up. I wasn’t 100% happy with the rivets on the stiffners…. The rivets kept wanting to fold over doing the back-riveting. I tried my absolute darndest to keep that rivet gun 100% vertical, but that’s impossible with out a level on the backside of it. I would just give a few taps with the rivet gun and then check. Do a few more and check again. But usually once it started folding over it was a do-over. Oh well…

I also had to spend a bit of time redoing the lights in the garage. The original ones were already burned out. I couldn’t believe it. I got a different brand this time which required me to remount these.

I spent some time today getting these parts deburred, dimpled, and primed so that I can start riveting when I get back after the funeral tomorrow. Luckily these were final sized hole pieces which made it much quicker in getting back to where I was before the rudder fell.

I finally got some time to cut the new rudder ribs and sheer clips as well as rivet them to the new skin I had ordered. I went ahead and put the entire rudder together again just to see how it looked, fit, etc. I was short on table space (first error) and decided to keep working with the rudder in a precarious position (second error). As I went around to get another few clecos I bumped the table and the rudder fell to the ground.

After bending the damage out (I don’t have a picture of the damage after it dropped) I noticed that it had creased the skin and the bottom of the spar and they had a fine crack in them. With a huge sigh I went back to my desk and ordered the replacement skin and spar and put it to the side to cool off.

I finally got some time tonight to get out in the garage and disassemble the work I had just done. Luckily this time I was much better at getting the rivets off without enlarging the holes. So I didn’t have to order any new stiffeners. The new spar is my next step to prep and then the skin after that and I’ll get it all riveted back together. I hope to get some time to do that tomorrow but I have quite a few church activities to attend to. I also won’t have time on Monday or Tuesday as we will be holding the funeral for my grandfather-in-law. Here’s the aftermath of all the rivet drilling, or at least some of it. I had swept some of it to the ground already.

Luckily I’m not discourage still. I enjoy working on this and I’m learning lessons all along the way. I have gotten better at removing rivets like I stated and I’m also getting a little bit better at priming the parts. Still loving this 🙂

I spent a good 2 hours getting the new rudder skin deburred, dimpled and riveting the stiffeners on. I am kind of at a stand still now as I’m waiting for parts to come in which might be a bit longer with all of the snow going on here. Crazy snow and temperatures have covered Oklahoma over the past 5 days. I have been working from home for the past week with the ice that came before the snow. Luckily I’m catching up on some reading and cleaning up the garage so that it’s ready to redo the stiffener work and then getting the rudder put together. I’m super excited to get the parts in!

I also found a really nice and simple paint job for the plane! I really like this simple idea and it’s actually a fairly normal paint scheme as well, but it’s the silver, metallic, blue that they have that also makes it look really nice.