Saturday had about 3 hours of building, and Sunday had about 4 hours.

On Saturday we got the forward strut attach point bolted along with all the other related pieces drilled into place. Tightening the bolt closest to the skin is a major pain. Maybe some sort of inspection port nearby would be a benefit.

Sunday I fabricated the flaperon positioning template and got the flaperon arms into place. I found a good way to check if the holes are co-linear. Just use a spool of thread. Have one person hold the thread tight on one end, and then hold it tight on the other. If the holes are not co-linear then the thread will indicate which way the bracket needs to be moved.


I bought a right angle adapter from Home Depot a while ago, and it came in handy. The builders manual shows a nice way of not damaging the skin when using the drill in tight spots... a nice tip to have had earlier. My variation used an extra piece of heavy wing channel that had to be trimmed off. Since the wing channel is bent on both sides, the chuck can not move the protecting piece out of the way.

There is an optional step to place the tie down rings. I do not remember receiving the tie down brackets, although I could fabricate my own. The position of the brackets confuses me. It seems that attaching the bracket to the fifth rib is not the strongest place. Why is the loop not attached to the strut support? The strut support already is attached to the spar which would be a better place in case of a wind storm around here.



Project Status:
Wings: 60h ( 1h, 1h, 0.5h, 2.5h, 4h, 1h, 1.5h, 1h, 1.5, 4.5, 1h, 1h, 2h, 4h, 1h, 3h, 1h, 2h, .5h, 1.5h, 2h, 2h, 2h, .5h, 1h, .5h, .5h, 2h,3h, 1h, 3h, 3h, 4h )
Flaperons: ( DONE! ) 23.5 hours spent ( 3h, 1h, 1h, 1h, 1.5h, 3h, 6h, 3h, 4h, 1h )
Paint Design: 2 hours spent ( 1h, 1h )
Elevator DONE!: ~31.5 hours spent ( 3h, 1.5h, 3h, .5h, 3.5h, 2h, 4h, 1.5h, 2h, 4.5h, 1h, 6h )
Horizontal Stabilizer DONE!: ~28 hours spent, 3 pieces replaced ( 3h, 2h, 2h, 2h, .5h, 1.5h, 3.5h, 1.5h, 5, 4.5, 2h, .5h )
Rudder DONE!, minus horn : ~16 hours spent, ( ~8h, ~8h )
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Total Done: ~163.5 hours