Weekend Update

The ribs and small bits for the center section are now etched and primed. I’ve started to install all the nut plates on all the ribs. Looks like I am finally going to need to break out the double offset rivet set this week to assemble the skeleton.

Sore Shoulder

This was my weekend. Dimple Baby Dimple! It’s a good isometric exercise at least. Oh— and notice the reading glasses. I am officially getting old. I am stunned at how worse my near vision has gotten in the last six months. After cleaning and etching the center section parts, I’ll be using my super undercover, top secret spray booth location for priming as Mother Nature just won’t cooperate anytime soon.

The Skinny

Today was focused on finishing all the center section parts. First, the baggage ribs with the undrilled holes were fixed and dimpled. Then I spent most of the afternoon getting the huge 776 skin prepped. Reaching to debur all those holes makes for a sore back. Thankfully prepping all the edges is more zen-like. Finally, in between family movie night (Despicable Me) and mom and dad movie night (The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets Nest), the center section bulkheads were dimpled.

Up next is dimpling the big skin and cleaning all the parts for priming.

Ribs and Things

Tonight I was able to finish up deburring all the holes from match drilling the center section together. In addition I dimpled all the ribs including both 623s and the attach straps. There’s a bunch of little random parts I need to keep an eye on when it comes time to prime everything as they are easily lost.

I goofed on both 727 baggage ribs and missed match drilling every other hole. I need to reattach and match drill when I get the skin down to prep it for final assembly. After some debate I decided to prime the inside of the skin. Never know when that drink might spill.

The Great Debur Fest

This weekend I was able to finish drilling all the holes on the center section, countersank the four holes in the front 704 bulkhead, and make the attach straps for the F-623 ribs. Now the 776 skin is off. Once the rest of the parts are disassembled, then it all gets deburred, dimpled and primed. That last part is gong to require some better weather than we’ve been getting.

The Heart of the Beast

Happy MLK Day! The family granted me some quality time in the garage this weekend so I was able to get most everything assembled and drilled on the center section. I had KEXP rockin’ on my little portable radio and the weather was finally mild enough that I didn’t have to wear my bulky winter coat in the garage. On to the build:

The center section is a simple enough set of parts: A couple of bulkheads, 16 ribs and the center skin. However, this is the heart of the fuselage with some very important intersections. The gold piece in the photo above is one-half of the 704 bulkhead. This is where the main wing spar attaches to the fuselage. The gray bulkhead in the back is the 705. It’s where the rear spar of the wing attaches and the seat backs lean on.

All the control systems and most of the airplane wiring route through this section. This means there’s lots of holes to be drilled and formed between parts. It all adds of up an endless list of little steps. If you look close above you can see a spacer between the flange of the rib and the bulkhead. When I first clecoed everything together I forgot to insert these four spacers. There’s no way to slide them in after the fact so I had to take everything apart and reassemble. Oh well, it helped me figure out a riveting strategy for this section.

Here’s 2 out of 8 half circles divots I had to take out of the middle row of ribs. These allow for wire to be routed aft for lights, autopilot, GPS, and ELT or whatever electronic gizmos I’ll want in 5 years.

The F-715 ribs on the outside don’t get drilled until later. So they are just clamped in place for now.

This is actually the topside of the center section. Because I need to drill out the skin, it’s much easier the build this part upside down.

I tried to take a panorama of the workshop tonight but the pics came out blurry. I’ll try again tomorrow and give my version of the state of the union for the RV-7 build. Right now you’ll just have to settle for this picture of the three main sub chunks of the RV sitting in the garage. To the right is one of the wings in the wing cradle. In the back is the center section and in the mid ground is the aft fuse patiently waiting to be finished.

Next up is to finish the drilling, disassemble, debur and dimple everything. Then I have to figure out just where to prime these parts as the weather is so iffy this time of year. See you in a few days.

Aft Fuse Riveting Part 2

Here’s the project progress from the last couple of weeks. I’m including a lot of pics as these are some of the more interesting sections of the fuse to put together. My friend Paul came over for round two of riveting the aft fuse. We got all the rivets at the far aft end done. We had to drill out 3 or 4 along the way. There’s just a few left on the 707 and 708 bulkheads and J-channel. Another couple of hours should do it.

Next up, I’ve started the initial assembly of the center section after prepping all the ribs (did I mention how tedious that is?). It’s quite the Rubik’s cube to get everything in the right spot. The 776 skin and right side baggage space ribs were just not going together. After silently cussing out Van’s CNC machines for a few hours, I discovered I had the 725R and 726R swapped. WHOOPS. Now everything is clecoed together waiting to be drilled, deburred and dimpled.

One thing I overlooked in my excitment to get the aft fuse together was prepping the rudder cable exit. That little hole to the left of the pass through hole above is for the screw mount. It should be drilled for a #8 screw and dimpled BEFORE the skin is assembled with rest of aft parts. Now I need to get clever about how to dimple the hole.

All the ribs except the 2 outside 715 L and R ribs cleco in place. After everything gets put together, I will need to come back and drill out the front of the 715 ribs using the 704 bulkhead as a guide.

This is the outside intersection of the F-715R rib and the F-705 bulkhead. The bottom flange gets drilled out for a bolt.

Here are the 716/715 ribs and the aft part of the F-704 bulkhead. These will be a mixture of -4 sized rivets and bolts. I’ll need to be ginger while drilling this stuff.

Finally here’s a close up of the last couple of bulkheads in the aft fuse after riveting. The seams on the skins are all tight and I am really happy how it all turned out. The only cosmetic issue is a slight smile on one of the rivets that sits under the HS. I actually think its awesome. I see it as a signature that no other kit will have. However, one signature is enough! Onward…

Prep work

Here’s a picture of clouds as they are way more exciting than seeing more metal prep work. The garage was cold and it was 10pm but I made myself go work on deburring and scuffing more of the center section ribs. That’s about as exciting as I can make it seem. Plan is to starting drilling on the center section over the break. Six more ribs to go. Ugh.

Center Ribs Prepped

This past weekend I finished prepping all the F-716 ribs for the center section. There are left and right versions with special mods for the center four of the eight. Then it’s your typical drilling, edge prep and scotchbrite treatment. Now I’m waiting to sneak into the School of Art spray booth for some priming before adding nut plates. Once complete I can start temp assembling the center section for match drilling. On another note, I have some help coming over on Sunday to knock our the aft fuse riveting finally.

The extra clearance in the center is for the control column linkage.

Center Fuse Start

For whatever reason I am dragging my feet on riveting. I need to recruit partner, commit to a day, and be done with it. Plus I need all my clecoes back to put the center section together. In the meantime, I can’t help but get started with the center section parts prep. Sunday I started making all the cuts on the two F-715 and eight 716 ribs including the rib access plate cutouts, spacers, wiring holes, etc. Next up nutplates and figuring out how the hell I am going to fit this all in the garage! With the wings and aft fuse already in there, I need to get creative about where to fit this assembly. The footprint alone is about 4×3 feet.