Joshua's RV-9A Project

Got a good block of time in the shop today, but I fear things will slow down now, as I am in need of a couple tools I don’t yet have.  I need to buy or create a back-rivet plate to set the stiffeners to the skins, and I need a vice-grip dimpler (or other suitable tool) to dimple the holes in the rear ends of the rudder ribs (will also need this for the elevators), where a dimple die is just too big to fit.  Also need a #10 dimple die for the counterweight screws.

No work on the project for several days due to going out of town for the holiday, and spending some extra time there.  Today, I started by fabricating the R-918 L & R strips, which serve to attach the fiberglass rudder bottom to the structure.  They are essentially identical, save for the direction they are dimpled.  After that, disassembly of the rudder ensued, followed by plenty of deburring and dimpling fun.  I also countersunk the trailing edge wedge, and ended up clecoing it into the skins for fun, to see how it fit.  I checked every c’sink as I went along with my dimple-tester scrap, and was pleased to see it looks decent with the skins clecoed into the wedge.

Rudder parts are ready for etch & priming, except for the things that need more dimpling.

This entry was posted on Saturday, July 7th, 2007 at 10:05 pm and is filed under Rudder. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.