Empennage - August 2005

8/8/2005	0.75h	Whoa! How's that for a break? Finally back at it, though I've had a fairly busy July. Went to Oshkosh. =) Mmmm. Space Ships... Fun stuff. I'll put some pictures up soon. As for today and the RV-7A project, I spent about 45 minutes with around half of the stiffeners and the Scotch-Brite wheel. It's a lot of work to get those edges smooth. More to do still. Oh yes. I also did more rearranging of the garage in prep for the quick-build kit. Barb called while I was walking the floor on July 30th, saying it was ready to go. I'm planning on going on the 12th to get it.
8/9/2005	1.5h	Finished off the stiffeners, ripped off a lot of blue stuff, cleaned up some edges, and clecoed them all to the skins. I also clecoed the 615-PP plate for the trim tab connection. All set to start match drilling...
8/12/2005	2.5h	Okay, so this is not quite the empennage. Hard to imagine. I've got an airplane fuselage and wings in my garage. Pretty cool. Started out good. Left work early and picked up the 26 foot UHaul in Beaverton. That took a little longer than expected and the traffic was awful, so I ended up arriving around 1:15 rather than one. I paid my ~$15k and Brian at Vans started to load up the truck. Lots of space, but I see why they want the UHaul. It fits quite nicely. Nice day.
		I unloaded the light stuff, then a couple folks came by at 5:30 to help me get the rest out. Tight fit in the garage. I'll need to make some extra gear to set this up right. I figure I'll make a pair of sawhorses to rest the fuselage at the right height and a simple cart to put the wings on.
		Many thanks to Bob Collins (left) and Kent Robinson (right), fellow ESI folks who made it out to help unload.
8/13/2005	2h	Okay, not a lot of direct work on things, but I did quite a bit more unpacking and prep work. I also made a painting table of sorts with some chick-wire I'm looking forward to not having such an awkward priming experience again. In addition, I slipped in and a run to Home Depot and picked up supplies to make the saw horses for the plane and a wing cart for transporting the wings around. (In between a number of other errands, biggest of which was a TV antennae, since our reception was pretty flaky.) Look how dirty the QB was with the oily film. This afternoon was flaming hot so I ended up asleep on the couch rather than working in the garage. Today was the first day this summer that I've wished we had AC. (I'm a lot better off than Katy, who is now 7 months pregnant.) I'll pick up with the woodwork tomorrow.
		Of course, since I had the quick build kit, I also had to sit and make airplane noises.... And since we're talking airplanes, note the theme for the nursery.
8/14/2005	6h	Long day of outdoor work, most of which was project related, though not all. The six hours is a bit of an estimate, but that's okay. I started out with plans to build a cart and sawhorses. Well. I got the cart done. Boy was it hot again today. Moved the wings up onto the cart, then decided to take the rest of the hot part of the day off.
		I headed back out in the evening to start work again on the elevators. Made some good progress with match drilling and deburring all of the stiffeners and deburring one of the skins. Oh yes, don't forget the 615-PP plate for the trim mount. I labeled everything neatly so that I can get them back to their correct locations. Did I mention deburring? Katy was there for moral support.
8/15/2005	0.5h	Finished the edge prep and deburring on the elevator skins and motor mount for the trim tab. Ready to prime and back rivet the stiffeners.
8/20/2005	0.5h	Cleaned the parts for priming.
8/21/2005	4h	I started out priming those parts that were ready to go, then followed with building a table/sawhorse to put the fuselage up on. This raises it about 2 feet up and let me move the stuff out of the living room and under it.
		In the afternoon I started dimpling. I finished all of the stiffeners and went about half way through the skins with some assistance from Katy. I learned that the C-Frame like dimpling is REALLY back for the holes closest to the bend in the back of the elevator. Luckily I started on the bottom of the skin and paint covers many sins. I switched to the pop rivet tool for dimpling. Slow, but effective. Katy got tired, so we stopped before finishing the job. Looks like it will have to wait until I'm back from India in a week.
8/30/2005	1.5h	You know it's bad when... I started out in the garage with an hour to work on finishing the dimpling of the skins for the elevator. Katy was helping to hold the skin but she got tired of standing quick and wanted to go inside. So... I joined her. I did all of one skin and about half of one side on another using the close quarters dimple die and the pop riveter. I had to keep taking the nails out to the grinder as the pop riveter was making them not fit through the dies. That was a lot of work.
8/31/2005	0.5h	Too bad I started so late. Only a half hour in this evening, as the next set of work is riveting. I started some of the back riveting only to see Katy come downstairs and ask me to stop. Didn't realize quite how load it was. At least I've got all of the rivets in place on the bottom right skin. Ready to go tomorrow.