September 18, 2020
Page 6-2: Step 6, Page 6-3: Step 1-2
I finally got steps 6 and7 done! The holes are countersunk for the rivets on the bottom half of the front side of the spar doubler and all of the other pieces have been deburred. I might need to go back and redo some deburring as I’m still trying to learn what is the right amount, but so far so good! It’s looking nice all put together even though I have to take it apart again 🙂
September 16th, 2020
Page 6-2: Step 2 – 4
Well, I’m not cheering too soon haha. It will be coming apart again to get reburred, but this is its first time together! This was Section 6, Steps 3-5.
September 15th, 2020
Page 6-2: Step 1 & 2
I just got cleared to start doing work again. I’ve been out since June 24th due to rotator cuff repair. I will say, I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy. I got almost back to where I was before my mistake in one hour tonight. Update pictures below! It is looking much better this time.
July 10th, 2020
Page 6-2: Step 4
I’m glad I found my mistake early on in the build. And it reinforces to me the absolute importance of reading sentence by sentence and understanding exactly what they are expecting. Also… Don’t have preconceived idea of what they want either. My first mistake was when I was clamping down the rear spar caps to the rear spar. I totally forgot that I had these clamps in my tool box that I could use.
In my haste to get started I just head the rear spar cap against the rear spar and drilled a hole in the middle. I then clecoed that and went on my way. Well little did I know that as I was going along, drilled out material was building up inbetween the two parts, creating a gap. Thus the rear spar and the rear spar caps didn’t truly meet flush like they should have.
My second mistake was drilling the #40 holes with a #30 drill bit. Probably not a huge mistake and I could have just used the 1/8″ rivets, but I want to follow the instructions exactly to the point, as I am pointing to here in this image.
But I did get some work done today! I got the VS-1008 piece completely deburred and I also got some additional clamps that I hope will help out in scenarios such as this.
All in all, I am still very positive about the build, even though this was just the first few steps in the build LOL. I knew this was going to be my down fall, and something I need to change anyways. This is a $49 dollar lesson as I wait for the replacement parts to come in.
This will give me some more time to continue rehab with my shoulder anyways, as doing this work was pretty stinking difficult without the use of my shoulder the way I wanted it. I would use my left hand to basically grab things close by or to push down on parts slightly, but it was pretty useless LOL. Luckily my first physical therapy visit went well today and they were surprised at how well I’ve already progressed just resting at home. So here’s hoping I get through this therapy quickly and fully recover the use of my shoulder as I’ve been missing it dearly for the past year and couple of months since I hurt it.
July 9th, 2020
Page 6-2: Step 2 & 3
Not a ton to write about today. I got the holes match drilled between the rear spar and the spar caps. The only odd thing is that, even with them held firmly together, the shavings from near by holes would cause it to push out some and I didn’t notice until I was almost done. I’ll have to see what I can do to get it flush on both sides. I might have to find a better clamping solution as well as my small wood bar clamps don’t get enough perches to hold the pieces together very well.
Here are some more photos of the spar and spar caps clecoed together.
July 8th, 2020
Page 6-2: Step 1
I was cleared by my doctor today to do some very small movement of my shoulder. I didn’t waste anytime getting into the garage to get started on the plane 🙂 I honestly did not use my left arm much but to guide parts through the band saw or to run it through the bench grinder for deburring.
I got the initial cuts done on parts VS-1014 which turned them into VS-1014-L and VS-1014-R. I fitted the deburring wheel to my bench grinder and got the long exposed edges deburrred on all of the vertical stabilizer parts. Hopefully tomorrow, I will get the bits cut for my detailed deburring tool and get those small areas done so I can cleco everything together and start match drilling.
I just recently had rotator cuff repair surgery so I’m not going to be able to do too much with the build for another month or so. But I did want to go on ahead and get everything organized and ready to go.
I had my boys take all of the parts that I wouldn’t be using upstairs for long term storage. We stored them in reverse order so that I would be able to access parts as I need them.
I also spent some money to buy some organizing units and I split up everything into individual part numbers. It will help me find things down the road. Here are a few pictures to document the progress. I also removed the protective covering from all of the parts so that I would have one less thing to worry about when I start cutting, deburring, etc.
I spent about 4 hours in total doing all of this organization. I need to figure out how I’m going to document the work hours to each of these posts. Luckily I have a few weeks to worry about that. LOL
