Riveted the Bottom Skin on the Left Wing

We had an "airplane party" this evening. I invited three families to come and have pizza and soda pop, see the airplane and pull some rivets. It was a great success. The family members took turns pulling rivets. I only had to drill out 4 rivets after the work was finished.

I also showed Cameron and Paul how to squeeze rivets. They were able to squeeze the rivets on the landing light mounting brackets and lens backup straps.

Those who helped:

Tim Sutton, Cameron Sutton, Kaleb Sutton, Paul Kidd, Matthew Kidd, Sarah Kidd, Mike and Holly Kidd, Kerri Sutton, Tami Warner and Arlene.  They all want to come back and do it again.

Landing Light Mount and Hatch Cover

Today I separated the parts for the landing light mount that will be installed inside of the right wing.  I dimpled the eight holes at the top and bottom edge of the landing light opening in the right lower outboard wing skin.

I used the microstop countersink and prepped the mounting plate doublers for the flat head rivets.  I then primed the parts and clecoed them together.

They are now ready to be riveted.  I then dimpled the edge of the access hatch opening in the bottom of the left wing.  I also dimpled the nutplates to be riveted to the wing skin and dimpled the holes along the edge of the hatch cover.

I then clecoed the nutplates to the edge of the wing hatch opening.  I then cut the holes for the nav/stobe light installation in the lower wing tip coverings.

Left Wing Skins

I started to clecoe the skins to the bottom of the left wing. I removed the blue film and put the inboard section in place. I enlarged the #30 hole in the outboard wing skin for the tie down ring. The hole was enlarged to 3/8" diameter with the unibit. It worked really well.

 I then clecoed the skins in place.  I will install the center section of the skin tomorrow.  I also marked the skins with blue tape in the locations where I am not supposed to install rivets.  Comments around the shop are that they are beginning to look like wings.  That is a good thing.

Left Wing Terminal Brackets & Wires

I installed the terminal bracket on the left wing. I fabricated and installed the 18 ga wire from the stall warning device and attached it to the terminal block. I fabricated and installed the left ground wire. I also installed the left navigation light/strobe wire from the left wing tip and attached the inboard end to the terminal block. I labeled the wires WH-B218 for the stall warning device and WH-B212 for the wingtip nav/strobe.

 I prepped the terminal bracket for the right wing by fabricating and attaching the ground wire.  I installed and labeled the right wingtip nav/strobe wire. I also fabricated and installed the landing light wires.

Stall Warning Vane and Terminal Brackets

I assembled the stall warning micro-switch and vane. It was fairly straight forward and simple to fabricate. I deburred the edges and holes of the mounting and retainer plates. I used the countersink on the different sized holes on the mounting plate. I primed the two plates and assembled the parts.  I fabricated the ground wire with the called out end connections.

I installed the stall warning device on the appropriate wing rib on the left wing, then checked to make sure it cleared the wing skin and deflected properly.  All seems to be in order.  Next I removed the tabs and deburred the terminal brackets. 

I primed the brackets and prepared them for the final assembly with the terminal blocks.  I used the template to mark and cut the terminal blocks to the correct size and shape.  I then clamped the template to the blocks and #40 drilled the holes.  I then final drilled the #30 and #19 holes as needed.  I then assemble the brackets as instructed and set them aside until they are needed.

Right Wing (continued)

I used the close proximity tool to install the LP4-4 rivets connecting the main ribs to the spar. After attaching the main ribs I drilled and riveted the rear sub-spar to the ribs.  I then clecoed and riveted all of the nose ribs to the main spar along with the forward sub-spar. The right wing skeleton is now complete and I can move on to the next step – build the stall warning device.

Right Wing (continued)

I clecoed and riveted all of the main ribs to the right main spar.  I pulled all of the LP4-3 rivets to the attach angels.  I will now have to pull the LP4-4 rivets attaching the ribs to the main spar.

Right Wing

I moved the left wing skeleton from the work bench to the wing stand. I started to install the ribs on the right wing spar.

Left Wing Assembly

I started to assemble the left wing. I started by riveting the doublers to the ribs and drilling the hinge brackets.

 I removed the clecoes from drilling the hinge brackets and deburred the holes.  I also discovered I had marked the ribs with an 'L' and an 'R' incorrectly so I changed them.  I set the brackets aside until needed at a future time.

I then began attaching the main ribs to the left main spar.

After I had the ribs clecoed to the spar I began to install the rivets.  

I attached the rear spar to the ends of the main ribs and match drilled the holes in the most inboard rib.  I took it apart and deburred the newly drilled holes.

I had to use the close proximity tool I made to install the rivets next to the hinge bracket.  I also used this tool to rivet the ribs to the main spar.

After the rear spar was riveted in place I laid the wing assembly flat and began to install the nose ribs.

I clecoed all of the ribs in place, then attached the front stub spar.

I finished riveting all of the nose ribs and the front stub spar in place.  I am now ready to begin working on the right wing.

Trimmed and Drilled Main Wing Ribs

I used the band saw to trim off the attachment angles from all of the right main ribs and six of the left main ribs.  I used a piece of 2/32" birch plywood to back-up the ribs on the band saw table.  It worked very well as a support for the ribs.  I learned this by watching a video on the EAA homebuilders website.

 

After trimming the ribs I deburred and polished the edges with the 6" Scotch Brite wheel. 

I selected one of the trimmed left main rib and one of the trimmed right main ribs and clecoed the left and right rib doublers as shown on the drawing.  I matched drilled the #30 holes, removed the clecoes and deburred the drilled holes.

Deburr Main Ribs

Today I deburred the main ribs. I used the deburring tool to dress the edges of the flanges. By drawing the tool along the edge of the flange the burr is removed. I performed this procedure on all of the left and right main ribs.

 During the process I discovered on the right ribs that there were several of the edges that had some imperfections that prevented the deburring tool from going over the flanges smoothly.  I used a small file to remove these imperfections.  It was then easy to deburr the flanges.

Now that the flanges have been deburred, the next step will be to polish  the edges of the flanges and the lightening holes with a 1" Scotch Brite wheel.

 This afternoon I returned to the shop and used the Scotch Brite wheel to polish the edges of the flanges and the lightening holes.  After the edges were polished I used the fluting pliers to straighten all of the ribs.  I am now ready for the next step.

Continued Work on Nose Ribs

I finished deburring all of the nose ribs today.  I also cut of the rear flanges on the left and right ribs as instructed in the drawings.  I trimmed the upper and lower flanges from several of the ribs as instructed.

 I dimpled the ribs and nutplates as directed in the drawings.  I riveted the nutplates to three (3) of the ribs as instructed.