This morning dad came out to help again, and we finished up the wing root fairings. I used pliobond to attach velcro to the fuselage tubes in the area where the back cabin bulkhead attaches. I noticed a very small oil leak around the prop governor control head, and a few days ago I ordered…
Category: Tail Surfaces
Elevator, Horizontal Stab, Rudder
Installing the Landing Light
The only trouble with those fancy firewall pass-throughs that I made yesterday is that it’s hard to install them this late in the process. If I had installed them back when the boot cowl was still off, I would have been able to do it by myself. Since that’s not the case, it’s a two-person…
Spraying Blue
This morning I finished the masking work on the cowling. With the cowling in place I found that I needed to trim my new extended front baffles just a little, so I did. I added the rubber seals onto the front of the side and rear baffles, and installed the new 45-degree breather fitting that…
Horizontal Stab Fairings
Tabitha and Felicia came out to help today. We installed the new tubing in the sight gauges and reinstalled them. We deburred the previously-made wing root fairing for the right wing. The girls went home for supper while I stayed to make the root fairings for the horizontal stabilizer. They attach to the inboard rib…
Reinstalling the Tail Pieces
Today was a fantastic productive day in the hangar. I started by applying a little bit of superfil to yesterday’s wingtip extension. That is really some great stuff. The jig holes in the nose ribs on the left wing were 1/4 inch. This was just enough room for the AOA lines to fit through the…
Fairlead Pliers
I started re-installing the control cables today, and after a little bit of trying it became obvious that I was going to need to be able to get the fairlead clips on with the limited access that I had in the fuselage. I came up with the idea of modifying my snap ring pliers so…
Straggling Wires
Today was a day of rounding up loose ends. I finished bundling the wires aft of the firewall, and made a few more connections forward of the firewall. I installed the weather pack connector in the landing light wires that will allow for easier removal of the cowl. I also connected the oil pressure wire….
Removing Masking Tape
Tabitha especially enjoys removing masking tapes, so we both came out today and finished removing the tapes from last night’s paint session. She compares it to unwrapping presents.
Spraying Blue on the Tail Pieces
This afternoon I was able to get the correct combination of software, drivers, and cables to update the firmware on the Dynons. The D100 had been in service before, so it was only a few versions old. The D180 was factory new, and the firmware was very old. I also updated the HS34. Then I…
Painting White Pieces
This afternoon my Mom was in town again, so she helped by adding the masking paper to tail pieces. I use 3M fineline tape to mark the final edge, and then use regular cheap masking tape to hold masking paper onto that tape. It can be a little bit confusing sometimes to make sure that…
Spraying the Interior
I’m thankful for being able to spend some serious hours in the shop this month. Today was a good painting day, at least in the afternoon, so I spent the morning wrapping up a few more prep tasks on the fuselage interior. I couldn’t come up with an easy way to mask the floor area….
Painting Little Parts
I’m taking advantage of this relatively warm weather to get as much painting done as possible. Today was a long but productive day that started with getting the ailerons and right flap safely stored in the ceiling. I covered those parts with plastic to protect them from dirt and overspray that might escape the booth….
Second Coat of Polyspray
This afternoon I did a little bit more prep and sprayed the second coat of Polyspray on the fuselage, landing gear, rear seat back, scrap panel, and the patches on the tops of the horizontal stabilizer. I also removed the tapes from the right wing and started taping for the blue coat.
Wooden Ribs
There is some discussion in the Avipro building manual about adding spacers to the ribs. I made these out of poplar on the bandsaw and belt sander. I thought these turned out pretty well.
Taking it All Apart
My last session in the shop included putting almost all of the parts on the airplane, and my last entry here included flying in Dave’s Bearhawk. From those two highs, it’s time to carry on with progress and see a few lows. First I dug through my tubing scraps and was pleased to find one…
New ELT Antenna Bracket
Back a few years ago when I made and installed the antenna bracket for the ELT, I never got around to putting in a fairlead bushing. Now that I have, it’s a pretty loose fit. This is the third strike against this setup, with the incorrect height and limited cable clearance being the other two….
Oil Cooler Lines
A few days ago when I finally got the right oil filter installed, it became pretty obvious that the straight AN fitting that I was going to use for the oil cooler line wasn’t going to clear the filter. I swapped it out for a 45-degree nipple instead, which works much better. I made the…
Control Cables and Fuel Lines
In the last entry I mentioned that the lower right fuel line was going to need an extension. This morning I added that extension and made a line from the fuel valve to the gascolator. Next I routed the upper flap cables, made new rudder cables, and routed the elevator trim cable. It became immediately…
Planning for Prop Control
Today I reinstalled the horizontal stabilizer. The strategy at this phase of construction is to add as many of the existing parts as possible onto the airplane to try and fix any interference issues that may have crept up. I spent some time planning for the routing of the propeller control and prop governor oil…
Rudder Cable Decisions
This morning I spent a while organizing and cleaning up. I connected the rudder cables again, and found a slightly better way to connect the return spring. Instead of having it attach in line with the rudder cable, I drilled an extra hole in the pedal arm and moved the aft attach point down. In…
Landing Light Bracket
This morning I sprayed the last coat of polyspray on the flaps, ailerons, and rudder. I came back to the hangar after lunch to debur the left door skin and start making the landing light bracket. For a while I wasn’t sure if I was even going to install a landing light. It certainly isn’t…
Spraying Silver
This morning I sprayed the last coat of Polybrush on the parts. I cleaned up the fuel flow sensor that I wrote about in the last entry: This evening I sprayed the first coats of the silver poly-spray on the parts.
Spraying Continued
I’ve been on the fence about wanting to install a fuel flow sensor. Eric Newton found that he wasn’t able to get the required fuel flow when he had the sensor installed. I asked him for more details about that while we were at Oshkosh, and he said that when he took the sensor out…
Covering Spray
Our seats are at the upholsterer, so I need to hurry up and finish the headrests. I cut out some 8×8 .032 aluminum squares to use as the face and top. I used the bench grinder to remove some of the larger bits of the weld bead from the exhaust pipe. Since the temperature has…
Flap Trailing Edge
This morning I used the irons to smooth the rudder and prepare it for spraying. I’ll wait until the flaps and ailerons are done before I start spraying, since that process is better suited for larger lots. Speaking of the flaps, I started on those today too. I put the left flap and aileron on…
Wiring the GNS430
Here’s the rudder. All of the taping is done and it’s ready to smooth. I connected several more wires to the 430 today. It has a bunch of them, and it would have been many more if I were using a remote annunciator and indicator. The connectors on the back are divided into the three…
Rudder Lacing and Taping
These nice weather days have provided an excellent opportunity to spend some time in the hangar. Here’s the rudder after the first coat of polybrush: I finished the rudder rib stitching in about an hour and a half. This is one of those skills that gets faster with experience. I marked the areas for taping…
Covering and Wiring
Today I shrank the fabric on the rudder and applied the first coat of polybrush. While I was waiting for one side to dry I returned to the wiring. My 430 rack was a second-hand find, and the previous owner chopped off the wires right behind the connectors. I took all of those little stubs…
Rudder Covering
I took advantage of another great weather day to work on the rudder. I applied the fabric and it’s ready to shrink. This is a short entry, but it was a short day in the hangar too.
Electric Cables and Polyspray
I made a few more crimps on the large conductors with the whack-a-mole crimper, but none are really any better than the first. On a more productive note, I sprayed one last round of Polyspray on the tail pieces.
Instrument Panel
Today I finished enlarging the center hole in the instrument panel and attached the two Garmin racks. I added the Dynon trays, but did not yet cut the left flange off of the right tray. I’m planning to wait until I get the HS34 and its mounting hardware. Next I enlarged the holes for the…
Polyfiber Patches
I stopped by today to smooth out the patches with the iron/teflon combination and to add a bit more polybrush to fill the weave. At this point I’m waiting so that I can get the patches ready for the next spraying.
Second Polyspray
I masked off the area where I sanded through on the last work session. I used a rag with MEK to clean the fabric in that area down to a bare surface. I can see why the polyfiber products are so successful- this whole process was much easier than I expected. The damaged area needs…
Seats Ready for Covers
I started wet sanding the first silver coat today while Tabitha carved the last bit of foam. They are ready for transfer to Mississippi for covering. I also spent a little while carving down the wingtip foam to prepare for the first layer of superfill that I added to the wingtip for the position light….
Seat Foam and Silver
Tabitha came out today and we glued the foam together for the back seat cushion. I had planned on a 3″ thick bottom cushion for the back seat, but with a little bit of testing we realized that the headroom would be limited with a full 3″ cushion. Instead, Tabitha carved out much of the…
Spraying More Polybrush
The Polyfiber manual suggested that small runs or imperfections in the polybrush could be fixed with a sheet of teflon under the iron to spread out the sharp spots in the iron shoe and reduce tracks. I tried the technique on a few little runs and had good results. I also sprayed the next coat…
Spraying Polybrush
The Polyfiber manual suggests spraying a diluted coat of polybrush in cases where the the brushed coats have been sitting for a long time. I sprayed that coat this morning, then sprayed the first regular coat this afternoon. This schedule works out well with the temperatures, since it is usually too hot in the middle…
Finish Heat Smoothing
In two sessions today I finished the heat smoothing on the rest of the parts that are ready to go. I rigged up a way to hang the parts from the ceiling so that I can spray them all in one round. One strategy that I came up with for handling the problems with the…
Heat Smoothing
More ironing! Today I spent an hour and finished heat smoothing and ironing the tape edges on one elevator and both trim tabs.
Fabric Covering on Tail
One of the elevators still needed a little bit more reinforcing tape, so I finished that up today. Now I’ll just need to finish heat smoothing and I’ll be ready to spray.
More Position Lights
I stopped by Laney’s fly-in towards the end of the event, but there were still a few airplanes left, including a new Maule. I liked the step on the landing gear, and perhaps it’s worth investigating. In the hangar, Tabitha worked on getting the seats while I started roughing in the position light mounts. The…
Battery Box, Tail Pieces
Today I spent a little bit more time convincing myself that the tail alignment issues aren’t going to be important. I did find a minor difference between the kit and the plans when I measured the length of the tubes that hold on the horizontal stab pieces. The only potential complication from this tube being…
Aligning Tail Pieces
On a recent trip to Harbor freight I picked up another pair of adjustable height support stands to help figure out why the tail doesn’t seem to be lining up right. I leveled the fuselage left-right with a water level at the wing attach points. From there I levelled each stab half with a bubble…
Elevator Trim Pushrods
Today the river of airplane parts is flowing again with the arrival of my Oshkosh Aircraft Spruce order. I added the dimpled nutplates to the little boot cowl piece, and used my new fuel lube to install several NPT thread fittings that were on hold pending its arrival. Since my repaired elevator trim pushrods didn’t…
Try Swapping Stab Halves
Just to be sure, I tried swapping the left and right stab halves today. It didn’t seem to work out well. The holes in the front mounting tube did not line up correctly. I’m going to keep investigating, though my working time will be limited for the rest of the month. I’ve got to go…
Welding and Priming
The only parts that didn’t survive the move when we purchased the project were the tail struts. I haven’t been able to find them anywhere, and neither has Richard. This is unfortunate, since they are fairly expensive. I was able to buy another set from Mark, though he cautioned that they may need a length…
Test Fitting the Tail Pieces
Before I proceed with any of the covering steps, I want to be sure that I understand exactly how the tail goes together. To check all of this out, i tried a test fit. I repositioned the engine lift over to the downhill side of the airplane so that I could level it left-right. Our…
Rudder Pedal Springs
Sometimes building an airplane involves taking three steps forward, sometimes it means taking a couple of steps back. Today I spent a little while adapting some springs for the rudder pedals, but I don’t really like them. I also spent a while making the third version of the boot cowl panel, and also made it…
Test Fit Engine
Today was a busy day at the hangar. I started by drilling the holes in my new rudder pedal-cable straps. I wanted to be sure that the four straps were match-drilled, so I used a scrap piece of aluminum angle and some c-clamps to hold the straps stacked in place. After the first hole I…
Rudder Pedal Geometry
In our last episode, I was moving the rudder pedals forward to address the potential over-center problem that Mark at Avipro brought to our attention. Back when Richard was building, the consensus was to locate the rudder pedals for ergonomics. Subsequent experience led to a new recommendation to locate the rudder pedals exactly as depicted…
Patching and Taping
Today was another reasonably cool morning, so I did more fabric work. I didn’t take any pictures, but I was able to get almost all of the taping done. When I first started applying the polybrush, I realized that something wasn’t right. I had mixed three parts of reducer to one part of polybrush instead…
Elevator Patch and Cable Guards
Today’s efforts include a morning session of fabric work and an evening session of sheet metal work. Richard had started the taping process on the tail pieces, but some are still in the works. Since one side still had exposed rib laces, I figured that I would check to be sure that they were spaced…
Boot Cowl and Tail Examination
Today I cut out a new piece of aluminum to replace the one that I made wrong (and that I would make wrong again) while Tabitha dimpled the stainless exhaust tunnel and installed nutplates on the appropriate sections. I also calibrated the iron in preparation for covering and started to evaluate the tail pieces to…