Final Assembly
I spent the day by myself since Tami was up at her folks for the holidays. Because I stayed up until 2 am priming the elevator skins, I didn't wake up until NOON!!! I couldn't believe it, the day is half over already.
Today was fairly productive since I was able to complete the right elevator with the exception of rolling the forward edge.
Riveting the right elevator was an uneventful evolution... That means I won't have to buy replacement parts from Van's on this component.
At the trailing edge of the stiffeners and skins, I put a high temp RTV (safe for aluminum) at the tips. Van's states to do this to prevent the stiffeners from rubbing and making contact with the opposite side skin/stiffener during vibrations experienced during flight which could result in skin damage, cracking, etc.
When I folded the skin over, the stiffeners did not even come close to touching, but I put in the RTV as an added measure of protection.
The elevator counterweight mounting screws were torqued to 25 in-Ibs.
The right elevator turned out really nice. The two rivet holes that were slightly deformed during the dimpling process on the trailing edge are hardly noticeable. Now all I have to do is roll the forward edge and rivet.
Right Elevator Priming
- I only had a couple of parts to primer, however, this evolution took all night. This sure goes smoother when Tami helps out.
- The whole evolution went pretty well, however, I had to mix up primer twice as I ran out of primer...
- It was getting really late and I was getting in a hurry... The priming on the last part didn't look nearly as nice as some of the other stuff I have done. I attribute it to one of two reasons, to much curing solution for the amount of primer I had, or not waiting long enough for the induction time (which is 30 minutes).
Needless to say, by the time I got done, it was 2 am.
De-Burring And Dimpling
- De-burred and dimpled right elevator skeleton.
- Debur and dimple right elevator skin.
- Moved left elevator stiffeners with left elevator parts.
- Late start due to working overtime tonight.
Final Bend In Right Elevator
After priming all parts (including the skin), it was time to back rivet all the stiffeners on the skin. This went very smoothly. the last rivet on the trailing edges was a little tough, but they all came out great.
Once the stiffeners were in place, it was time to make the final bend in the elevator skin so that the skin will lay nice and straight when riveted to the elevator skeleton. In order to make the final bend, I had to make the makeshift brake to fold the skins over. I used two 2" x 8" x 8' and trimmed one to 7 foot long.
NOTE: This brake is too long. It appears you could cut this down to 5 foot with no problems. the only problem I have with it being so big is that it is just awkward to handle.
After completing the brake, I set the skin in the brake and bent it over. It took several tries with the skin progressively farther from the hinges in order to get a nice bend. I am still not thrilled with the bend, but I tried everything I could think of to make that bend as sharp as possible. I now see why Van's made the new rudder the way they did (a lot sharper and crisper trailing edge).
Once I got the bend done on the skins, I inserted the elevator skeleton, cleco's and final drilled all remaining holes.
Trimming The Lead Counterweights
Trimming the lead counterweight turned out to be a major pain in the A_S. I tried the band saw with the metal blade in it. DIDN'T WORK!! The counterweight grabbed the saw blade and ripped it right off the pulley wheels on the band saw. Then I tried a hacksaw to rough cut. DIDN'T WORK VERY WELL EITHER. The lead just plugged the hacksaw blade and then it wouldn't cut. After struggling with this, I got it pretty close and then used a vixen file to take it down the rest of the way and smooth it out. I used a Dremel grinding wheel then to radius the trimmed out area. It didn't look to bad when I got done. It took a sweat, and about 1.5 hours to trim that dang thing out. Good thing that this was only required on the right elevator counterweight.
The rest of the day was just drilling, deburring, and dimpling stiffeners and elevator skins. I did have a little trouble getting the aft most hole dimpled. I tried the C-Frame with just me holding it since Tami is at her folks. I was not able to hold it square on the C-Frame and it distorted the skin. I figured it out after the 2nd hole, but they are on the top side (DANG). I then used the close quarter dimple dies and they turned out to work pretty good on the elevator skins. I went down stairs and got some nails (4D, a.k.a. 4 penny) from out stock in the basement. I was snapping the shafts supplied with the dimple dies after about 2-3 holes. the nails worked good and when they snapped, I had a whole box of spares.
I was out in the garage over 12 hours, but only seemed to get in about 9 hours of productive work in. Gotta make my own meals now that Tami is gone for the week.
Preparing The Elevator Stiffeners
After moving satellite, I spent the rest of the night cutting elevator stiffeners for the left and right elevators. Van's has done a nice job with the stiffeners, as they are all pre-punched and notched where the stiffeners should be cut and tapered. Almost no measuring is required, just draw lines between the "notched" cut-out locations.
I was a little confused when it came to the trim detail as there is an "x-dimension" that refers you to note #1 which states that for stiffeners E-720 J, K, and L (left elevator) to be trimmed to various dimensions to fit into the left elevator. Being confused, I cut stiffener E-720L from the pre-punching's on the uncut stiffener from Van's. It fits correctly without being trimmed and the additional material from the trailing end. The print denotes that from the center of the second hole from the trailing edge to the edge of the stiffener should be 2" (i.e.: X=2). If I would have trimmed the trailing edge as per the print, the last hole in the trailing edge of the elevator skin would not be attached to the stiffener. I will watch this closely when I fit the skins together tomorrow. Van's has been pretty accurate so far so I want to make sure I am correct before I disregard Van's instruction on this.
NOTE: Later, I check the fit of all the stiffeners again. They will need to be trimmed per Van's instructions, however, I would match drill the most aft hole prior to trimming stiffener IAW note #1 (if possible). In some cases, very little material was removed from the stiffener.
22 stiffeners, snipped, sawed, and de-burred tonight. A lot of tonight's time was spend on the band saw and the bench grinder.
