Reworked mistakes on the Vertical Stabilizer and worked on the rudder

Got to the shop Tuesday for 5 hours!! Made a ton of progress it feels like. My friend Matt stopped over and helped for 2 hours, it really makes the time fly by when your working with someone. I set my phone up to take video so i can edit it on my computer and add youtube links, I think I will be able to explain by narrating videos better than just typing away. The only problem is my phone is to new and my computer to old so they wont talk to each other with Apples new picture and video format. Not to be discouraged I bought a camera stand for my Sony DSLR and Im gonna try and take video with that and upload it directly to the computer. Anyway... Here is Matt removing the blue plastic from the outside of the skins where the rivets are. He is using a ruler as a straight edge and a soldering iron to melt the plastic.

Vertical Stabilizer

I spent the first part of the day reworking the spar on the rudder that I had previously drilled the wrong holes in. In the picture below I drilled the white brackets to spar attaching holes to a #12 and they should only be #30.

This is what that spar should have ended up looking like with the brackets and the double attached.

After I finished drilling and putting together the spar I took apart the Vertical Stabilizer and installed the new spar to match drill the holes. I am still waiting on the smaller front spar replacement and should have waited putting the skin back on to match drill I think. The nose on the leading edge ribs digs into the inside of the skin each time I try to maneuver the skin into place. Ill have to work out the scratches before priming the skins.

Rudder

After I reached a stopping point because Im still waiting on parts I turned my attention to the Rudder. The Rudder has a counter balance weight, E614, that needed to be countersunk and the R-912 Rib needed to be dimpled so I started with that. I haven't used my countersink cutters yet so there was a small learning curve to figure out how to get the depth set correctly. Mostly cut, check, readjust, cut more, repeat. This was one of the things I took a video of, so hopefully I can get it processed and put up.

Somehow I managed to loose 1 of the AN5909-10R16 bolts, I really don't want to order a new one because it has to be in the shop.....I think. I assembled the Rudder support brackets and matched drilled next.

After I got all the parts installed that I had prepped and noticed I was missing the top 2 support brackets! I went to the parts rack and there they were, but I ran out of time and had to head home. Next week Ill cut debur and install them.

Vertical Stabilizer 2.0 Hours, Rudder 3.0 Hours

Just an hour on the Vertical Stabilizer today

Vertical Stabilizer 

I didn't expect to get to the shop today, but I found about 2 hours today to bring over some new tools and work on the rudder a bit. Mom requested some photos with me in them so these are for you, Love you Mom! I think Im going try and use my old iPhone to record videos that I can talk over to narrate whats going on, I think I will be able to communicate my progress better that way? I guess we will see.

I decided to order more parts to replace the holes that I drilled wrong last week, the parts are cheap now and if they crack in the future the work and cost will be 100X. So another call to Vans and more waiting on more parts for the Vertical Stabilizer. Good news was today I didn't make any mistakes that need new parts, that I know of, Yeah learning to read plans!!

I take that back, as I was writing this the Fedex guy dropped off the parts for the Vertical Stabilizer!

My First Mistake new parts are here and hopefully tomorrow I can get them match drilled and when my second mistake parts, see above, show up I can finish the VS.

Paint Booth
I picked up a shop light at Menards the other day, I think it just what I need to get good light into the booth when the painting starts! I orders paint from Steward Aircraft Systems. I went with them because its non-flammable, non-hazardous, and contains lower VOCs than other options.

Rudder

Also got a Dremel Tool to use for cutting and deburring. The cutting wheel works great for trimming Rudder stiffeners. After cutting the stiffeners I deburred the edges on the 6" Scoth-Brite cut polish wheel. I need to be more research on edge deburring, I feel like I might be doing more work than needed.

Rudder 1.5 Hours

Paint booth and Vertical Stabilizer

Got back into the shop today. Finished up the air exhaust system for the paint booth, which I think finishes it up.

Vertical Stabilizer

Even though Im waiting on parts I decided to move ahead with what I could do and it turns out a lot. First I assembled the ribs onto the spars and final drilled all the holes that attach to the spar per the instructions, several of the holes that attach the rib to the spar are on the spars flanges. I drilled one of these before I realized that was y second mistake. These holes connect the skin to the flange and should not be final drilled that large. You can see it in the red circle below

Luckily I can just use a larger rivet for this hole, I just have to remember to match drill the skin and dimple that hole larger, I also have to buy a rivet cutter now to trim the rivets I have to size. Yeah a new tool! Below in the plans the blue arrow marks the hole I final drilled to large.

After finishing drilling the rest of the VS assembly, I cleco'd the skin onto the assembly and final drilled all the holes that match the skin to the assembly.

Now I just need the rear spar parts to come in to redo the assembly, final drill the skin to the new final assembly, disassemble, deburr, clean, prep, paint, reassemble, and rivet! Yeah...so almost finished with the VS.

Rudder

After I got as far as I could on the VS I moved onto start the rudder. Mostly it was just trimming and deburring parts. I have been using a hand deburr tool, 1" Scotch-brite wheel on my hand drill, and a 6" Scotch-brite wheel on my new bench grinder. I ordered a Dremel tool to help with trimming and deburring.

Vertical Stabilizer 1.0 Hours, Rudder 2.0 Hours

Inventory and..My first mistake :(

I did the inventory on all the hardware today, that was an additional 2 hours of Inventory work. But well worth it to know everything was there and it helped give me an idea of what I have to purchase a storage solutions sometime in the future. The parts list helps out a ton, it gives you the part number (for reordering when you mess up) and the build plans section it is in to match unmarked parts with diagram pictures.

 

After I finished the inventory I moved on to start building something!! The plans called for match drilling a doubler plate to the front spar of the vertical stabilizer, VS, then trimming the spar to match the doubler.

That all went smooth, then I had to dimple the metal for flush rivets. So i had to put together my C-Frame DRDT dimpler and the pneumatic squeezer. I have never used either so i ran a few test dimples in the metal I had cut off the front spar. One of the dimples is from the squeezer and the other 2 are from the DRDT, I couldn't tell a difference and they all looked properly set. So I figured I would use booth tools and see what I liked better.

The squeezer was faster when working with the smaller pieces so that is what I will probably use more of when I can going forward.

The plans then called for drilling some of the powder coasted brackets to the rear VS spar....This is where I messed up with the plans :( The plans say to Final Drill the #12 The rudder attach holes in the VS-410PP, VS-411PP, and VS-412PP Hinge Brackets as shown in figure 1. Figure 1 points to VS-410PP and says Final Drill #12, 6 places. VS-410PP has 6 holes total, 5 of which attach it to the spar. This is were I started to get confused, Final Drill #12 The Rudder attach holes, the VS41-PP brackets attach to the spar and have 6 holes, Figure 1 says 6 places. So I drilled booth brackets to the spar. When I was done I looked at the holes and knew this was wrong, they are way to big for the size of rivets I just inventoried.

After reviewing the plans more carefully they say Final Drill #12 the RUDDER attach holes, I drilled the brackets VS attach holes, the Rudder attach holes are the 1 hole at the end of the bracket...6 brackets = 6 holes. After a call to Vans I decided it was better to reorder parts rather than try and shoot 3/16 rivets into my extra large holes.

I only had about 40 minutes left to work for the night so I moved on and did a few of the next small, fluted a couple of flanges that were twisted.

Inventory 2 Hours, Vertical Stabilizer 2 Hours

Need to finish the Inventory

I finished the as much of the paint booth today as I can without my exhaust fan and was about to start on the airplane, then I realized I couldn't find a few parts. Naturally I was a little worried, but I thought they might be the back ordered parts so I needed to get home and look at the inventory sheets to confirm this. Not to self, keep the inventory sheets with the plans.

Turns out I need to do a lot more inventory. I have to go through all the little bags and check the parts to make sure everything is there. It said this in the instructions, but somehow my mind read it the other way. Wishful thinking I guess. Not a great start to following directions. More inventory tomorrow.

The Kit has arrived!

I started out this journey thinking I was going to build a Titan T-51, then thinking I have never built an airplane before maybe I should start with something a little simpler to build so I settled on the RV8. After talking with some friends about what I wanted to use the finally airplane for, longer trips with my wife or a friends, I decided the 7 might be a better choice. So I  decided to head out to Portland to take a tour of the factory and get a demo flight in the RV7. On my way out there I had somebody asked me why I was going, what questions did I have? I thought about it and I realized, I didn’t have any questions I was looking for reasons not to build the 7. After I got out there and talk to the guys I found that reason, the RV 14.

Quick Build Kits

The picture has a couple of the quick build kits, on the left, are the 7 on the right the 14.  You can see from the picture but the 14th is a little bit wider than the 7, and the fuselage looks like it’s only half. The fuselage looks like this because the empennage kit is much more substantial, and contains about 7 feet of the fuselage.

RV14

 After I got home from my factory tour I started ordering things. I started with the tools I thought it would noon, and I ordered the kit from Cleveland tools. Then I went and found warehouse space in Chicago near my apartment to build the airplane,  and then the empennage kit. The kit arrived right on time and I worked with the freight company to schedule finally delivery to my shop. I ,spent the weeks between ordering the kit and it’s arrival trying to get the shop ready, more on that in another post. The kit arrived and was undamaged, I was lucky to have my friend Matt with my to help do the initial inventory. Having a second person saved a ton of time reading and checking against the inventory list and unpacking the crate. Vans packing guys don’t mess around the parts are seriously Tetrised into the crate!

Setting up the Shop

I had to find a place where I could build the airplane, I thought about building it in a hanger at a local airport, but I live in downtown Chicago and any airport was gonna be an hour drive. I wanted something closer, something that if I only had a few hours I could still make it to and get some real work done. I started looking for Wharehouse space that I could rent. Luckily I’m not the only one who needs space to build things, or have small shops in so there is market for this in Chicago. I found a space that is close to perfect for starting out. It’s 400 sq. Ft. In the corner of the building with an exhaust fan in the ceiling already and a heater for the entrance way right above it.

The space is secure and lockable, which is really important to me considering how much Ill have invested in there once the tools and the airplane parts start to show up. Now I just have to design and build a shop!

AIR SYSTEM

I decided I want to prime the interior parts, right now I think I’m going to go with the Stewart Systems ExoPoly, so i needed to think out an air system that would all work to that end. I also might tackle the finish airplane paint job so I wanted all the components to work with a larger compressor in the future. I decided to go smaller for my air supply, fits my needs for now, and got a Craftsman 33 gallon compressor it will output 6.8 SCFM@40PSI so was my limiting factor for HVLP spray guns. Luckily for me I found one at Eastwood, the Concours LT, that was designed for home shops with small compressors that only needs 4CFM@30PSI and has an optional 1.5mm tip that the paint system I’m looking at using recommends, So far so good! I know in the future I’m going to want a much much bigger compressor, so I choose an air supply line system and filter to support that dream. I went with the RapidAir Maxline M7500 3/4” 100’ kit for the air supply line and fittings then for the filter I choose the DeVilbiss CamAir QC3. The trouble with using the 3/4” kit is having to step the size up and down. I used Flexzilla Pro High flow 1/4” NPT couplings, so I went from 1/4” coupling up to a 3/4” leader house to connect to the Maxline system. Then when the pipping got to the filter the filter inlet was 3/8” and outlet 1/4” so I had too get fittings to step down and back up. The outlet block are 3/8” so i had to get a fitting to step them down to 1/4” and then I added a 45 degree before the NPT. So while I like the 3/4” line for future Todd’s shop it added several steps and fittings to get everything to work. The Maxline was really easy to straighten without a tool, could it be straighter sure but would I spend the money on the tool if I did it over, No. Lastly I piped my Flexzilla hose reel to one of the outlet blocks and left the other one with a NPT fitting.

WORK BENCH

I found plans on the internet that I liked and tried to follow them, but ended up making a few modifications on the dimension. I might build another one in the future if i need the space.

PAINT BOOTH

I want to be able to paint in my shop, That is why I’m leaning toward the Stewart System waterborne paint since It’s non-hazardous and non-flammable. Still i wanted to control the air so i build a sudo paint booth. First i made a drop ceiling using 2 header boards and a cable hanger. Then I covered the top in 6mil plastic and created 6mil roll up curtain walls. I left part of the drop ceiling uncovered and put cheap furnace filters up there to filter the inlet air and am using a MaxAir 12” fan and hose connected to the exhaust fan in the space to remove air from the booth. Even though the paint is non-hazardous I’m going to use a nice furnace filter in front of the fan to filter the air before it leaves the booth.

TOOLS

I bought the RV14 Kit from Cleveland tools, I sprung for the DRDT2 and the pneumatic rivet squeezer. I’m sure I will need more tools alone the way like a bench grinder, Dremel, and probably a 1” bench sander. I’m going to wait and let the kit progress dictate the purchase of more tools though. For my paint gun I bought the Eastwood Concours LT and am planning on getting the DeVilbiss cup setup to make cleanup easier.