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Back to Building Progress
Back to Wing 2
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On the flap nose skin to nose ribs, blind rivets are
used. These are the blind rivets you were wishing for when
you were working on the empennage and wanted some nice, small, countersunk
blind rivets. Just leave those holes empty, because you get them
with the wing kit. You barely enlarge the existing #40 drilled and
dimpled hole, and these fit nicely. These will also be used on the
entire bottom flap skin to rib rivets. |
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A little modification to the blind rivet puller was
needed to pull the rivets on the tank attach brackets. Well, a
little more will be needed to pull the rivets on the lower nose skin, next
to the flap attach brackets. I've used the grinder to modify this
tool more than anything else. |
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These are the rivets I was talking about... they are
difficult to reach because they are so close to the flap attach bracket.. |
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Riveting the top skins to the spar is not too
difficult. You put the flap nose down in the cradle, and go down the
line. (sorry, no pictures) Then, riveting the top skin to the
ribs is a little more difficult. (again, no picture)
Then, the really difficult part awaits.
Riveting the bottom skin to the spar. To do this, you put the flap
topside down on the building board, weight everything down using a board
and shot bags, and then squeeze your hand and a bucking bar inside what
little space there is and buck the rivets.
This is another time where you want to tape and pad
all parts of the bucking bar except what needs to contact the tail of the
rivet.
By the time you get to the bottom skin to rib rivets,
you're happy that they're pop-rivets and you don't care how they look. |
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1 week building stop for a long business trip
(and another one next week)
I still completed 79 hours this month... in only 3 weeks. It was a
good month. I built a fuel tank, almost the complete right wing, and
nearly completed both flaps. And, every day this month was 90+
degrees. Maybe the heat makes me work faster. |
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The last step on the flaps is to finish the trailing
edges. This time, I didn't use any type of adhesive to hold
everything together. I just clecoed every other hole, put a rivet in
the open holes, and used the squeezer to just set those rivets enough to
hold everything together. Then, I removed the clecos and barely
squeezed the remaining rivets. Then, I moved to the backriveting
plate, and backriveted each rivet, first on one side, then the other using
a mushroom set. It turned out straight overall, with just a little
waviness in the skin. (you have to be within 6" to see it...
good enough for me) |
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(May 11, 2003)
I started pulling wire through the left wing to the
heated pitot tube, landing light, and nav light. I still haven't
riveted the bottom skins.
The yellow color is a string I'm going to leave in
the wing so I can pull additional wires later if necessary.
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(September, 2003)
Now that I've finished pulling the wires in the wing,
and I'm waiting for some other parts, I figured I should tackle the bottom
wing skins. I thought the only way to do it was with a helper, but
managed to do a complete wing in about 8-10 hours by myself over a couple
of days. |
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I clecoed a piece of wood along the bottom of the
skin and tied a string on it to hold the skin back. This enabled me
to reach under with a bucking bar and work the rivet gun with the other
hand. I started at the rear spar, and worked my way down the ribs 3
rivets at a time.
It was slow, and at times painful, but now my wings
are ready for fiberglass tips. |
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The pictures on this page are not the best quality because
they are highly compressed to save download time.
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