Lindy
10/16/2006
I had a goal tonight of finishing the ailerons. I missed it by about an hour or so. My dad came over tonight to help me rivet the top row of rivets since these are bucked and shot, and access for one person is nearly impossible. I found a different way to set this up, so I didn't have to lay on my back with the leading edge hanging over the table to set the rivets. This way allowed both of us to stand comfortably, and keep everything nice and straight. I used blocks of wood to clamp the spar to the table nice and tight, and leveled it out on each end.
Here's the finished top row...
There's a lot of little details that take time with these ailerons, which is the reason I did not finish them tonight. Here's some of the little stuff...riveting the top skins to the main/nose ribs and spar...
Van's instructions are out of order here. The next step is to put the brackets on. If you do this, there is no access to the rivets on the bottom ribs to skin area. I put mine on, realized this, and removed one bolt to swing it out of the way. Do yourself a favor, and leave them off until the end, there's no point in putting them on yet.
In order to keep things from twisting while setting these main rib and nose rib rivets, they suggest using a flat surface, and some sort of weight to keep it from shifting. I used my wood break since it's made from a very dense wood (it's HEAVY).
And here's where I stopped for tonight. Still have one aileron to finish end rib work, then both of them get the blind rivets along the bottom spar flange.
They both appear to be nice and straight, twist free to this point.
3.25 hours