Sunday, August 24, 2003

Finally Airplane Parts   At last I have reached the point of doing actual damage to the parts supplied by Vans. Here is the horizontal stabilizer in the process of match drilling holes for the rivets that connect the ribs and spars. These several steps wend smoothly.   _   The next step is to fit the ribs and spars into the skins. The nose ribs go in first Ö three on a side. Here is the one at the outboard end of the left side. The fit is tight, but all of the holes lined up OK.   The rib in the center of the skin is a different story. It seems to not fit. By pushing very hard, it is possible to get the clecos into the holes, but they cannot hold the skin in tight contact with the rib. The instructions say something about needing to adjust the flanges on the very nose, I will try to figure out what that means next. Other builders have also had difficulty at this stage. The most common suggestion is to rivet the center rib first. Others have added shim material to fill the gap between the skin and rib.   . 4:50:31 PM    comment []