Section 36 Aileron and Elevator Systems

RV14 Build January & February 

Aileron and Elevator Systems

Continue on with the Control sticks. Match drilling holes and cleaning out extra powder coating.

Looking at the kit supplied poles to drill

The powder coating was basically right on for how deep the control tubes go into the control brackets.

The control tubes must be a hard metal because they did a number on my drill bits. I had to step up 6 but sizes to drill rather than the 21 then 19 the plans say.

The through bolt to connect the control stick brackets to bearings is bent! Hard to see in the picture, but it wont go through the 2 bearings and the bracket.

 Well I can install the one side at least.

Checked the angle of movement. I ground the stops evenly when the plane was upside down during the joining of the fuselage sections. I did double check again with paper and still even.

Angle of movement are good!

Bib delivery!! Hardware, new plug and play control sticks, tools Oh my!!!

Generic sticks vs the plug and play stick. I was going to cut the kit supplied ones and but the control handle but adding up the cost it didn't make sense, wish I would have realized this before I drilled the other tubes. Oh well now I have spares?

Had to take the control sticks apart to see how they are wired. I am having most of the wiring done by Stein or from the kit, But I really want to understand it. The best way for me to do that is go work in there shop for 6 months, but since thats not possible I reverse engineer what they send me to make sense of it all.

Drilling the new control tubes.

Im dumb! I drilled the holes in the wrong orientation. The co pilot stick will have an extra set of holes drilled in it.

My innovative small washer holder.

Washer install

 Side sticks installed!

Aileron and Elevator Systems 7.5 Hours

Interior Topcaot

RV14 Build March 25 & 29

Interior Topcoat

I struggled to come up with a paint idea for the interior. I think I want a carbon fiber instrument panel so a lighter interior topcoat seemed smart. I have zero artistic ability so I hope this works with the final paint scheme.

I decided to go with Stewart Systems EcoCrylic Smoke Gray 2 part waterborne epoxy primer. I am really happy with how it sprayed out. I use a Concoure LT spray gun from Eastwood, it can run off 4.5 CFM. I set the pressure so when the trigger was depressed the air inlet pressure was 20psi, this was probably a little high, but it still sprayed well.

Started by masking off all the areas I dont want paint.

Firewall is masked.

Rear baggage area masked.

Moved the airplane into the paint booth.

Stewart Systems Paint. I didn't get a picture, but I used 400 grams of Part A. * I did mix up 50 more grams of color with the same ratios to finish the topcoating.

100 Grams of the flattener at a 4:1 to get a Satin finish.

125 Grams of Catalyst for a 4:1 of the 500grams of color and flattener.

55 Grams of Water, about half of the amount of catalyst used.

I did my best to fog coat and wet coat this on. As per Stewart Instructions. It was hard with the size of the gun and paint hopper and air hose limited access.

Finished product!

Couple smaller parts I sprayed. I also picked up 2 of these platforms to help stand on and get over the edge of the airplane.

Few days latter I installed the Upper FD Fuselage and Top coated all the areas that will be visible with the canopy up.

1 last part to install that I sprayed on its own.

Interior Topcoat 9 Man Hours 

Section 35 Upper FWD Fuselage

RV14 Build March 20, 29, 31, April 1 &2

Section 35 Upper FWD Fuselage

I needed to assemble the rest of the FWD Fuselage.

Admittedly for the seemingly little work this should have been it was kind of a pain. The top strip didn't want to line up and fluting was not going to help that.

Finally with clekoes, some fluting, and brute force I was able to line everything up.

 Installing the nut plates.

I had decided that I wanted the upper longeron top coated, so I painted before installing the Upper FWD Fuselage. After talking with Liz I decided to topcoat the parts of the upper fuselage that you will be able to see when the canopy is tipped up. So time to install it.

You can see the upper fuselage installed in the right of the picture already.

Pro Sealing the gab between the upper longeron, skin, and canopy frame seat.

I was a little annoyed about how Vans calls out pro-seal randomly during the build because these tubes are not cheap and I hate to only need a little and waste the rest. But this job uses 2/3 of a tube.

Liz helping mask with tape the areas I don't want to topcoat!

 Pop rivets installed.

After the cabin was top coated I continued on section 35. Working on the canopy emergency release.

I wasn't sure how to do this, I tried the band saw... Not great. Then I measured out the cuts on tape and used a dremel cutting wheel.

Tape on the tube after measuring, before the cut.

Cutting the tubes.

 Trimming and grinding the release pins. I used the Scotch-Brite wheel to grind.

Release mechanism test fit.

Measuring the cowling hinges.

 There are small canopy latch skin doublers, I over countersunk one and then decided I could fabricate my own replacement. The un-primed one is what I ended up with. After researching what this does, I dont think I made the 2 small openings square enough so I ordered a replacement.

Clamping the cowling hinge for drilling.

 I was a little more reckless with the side hinges when I drilled them and they are not perfectly straight. I for see this being a pain when Im trying to install and remove the cowling. So I took all the time I needed to get this one as straight as possible.

Counter sinking the upper longeron after match drilling the skins. The cage doesn't sit well so I help it back and kind of free handed it, tested with a rivet (you can see in the 3rd hole) finished with a hand tools when I was close.

Dimpled the rest of the sub structure.

Countersinking the hinges.

The curved hinge was tricky so I had to be a little creative on how to hold the hinge while countersinking.

Primed the canopy hinges.

Had a rattle can issue. It stopped spraying, but I could tell it still had paint, so i punched a hole in it to drain the paint out after the pressure left and use my detail gun to spray the paint with.

Didn't have all the pressure out yet. Oops

Got it all figured out and sprayed in the end.

Upper FWD Fuselage 19.0 Man Hours