Fuselage Top Skins

January 10th & 17th 2021, 16h

The fuselage Deck and Side Rails

January 3rd 2021, 3h

After some time of traveling in Arizona and Utah, I am excited to continue working on the plane.

I started by leveling (ah it was perfect!), then drilling and prepping the fuselage deck.

Then I proceeded with the side rails: drilling, fitting and prepping for riveting

Assembly of mid fuselage

May 24th, 31th 16h

We assembled and drilled the mid fuselage.  It came together quickly. It is cool to see the Fuselage parts coming together:

Assembly and riveting of Aft fuselage

April 5th, 19th, 26th, May 3rd, 10th & 17th, 48h

Riveted the aft fuselage:

Disassembled the aft fuselage, deburred, dimpled, primed, then assembled it back for riveting and checked alignment again:

Assembled the Aft Fuselage, checked alignment, and drilled:

Assembled and riveted some sub component of the aft fuselage

Bulkhead 706 to 712

March 22nd, 28th and 29th, 24h

We tackled the rest of the bulkhead, we prepped all the parts and moved on to riveting. We riveted all of them, except for 706.

 

 

Bulkhead 705

March 14th and 15th, 15h

We prepped and riveted bulkhead 705.  All went well, except for one bracket that did not align well.  So, I just ordered a new one.

Riveting bulkhead 704

March 1st, 9h

We finished riveting bulkhead 704.  We riveted all the brackets and the side sections.  Then we looked up and gathered all the hardware.  Bulkhead 704 is done for the time being.

Then I did a little preview into bulkhead 705, so I gathered all the parts.

Continue Firewall and bulkhead 704

February 23th, 7h

• I got the new wd-602 to finish the firewall, so after prepping the new part, I finished riveting the last corner of the firewall.

• Then I moved to finishing bulkhead 704, I got the new seat brackets.  So, I prepped them and got 704 ready for final riveting.

Bulkhead 704

February 9th and 16th, 16h

Next we started working on the bulkhead. First drilling holes for the bushings.  Then drilling the center sections to the sides.  Afterwards, fabricating the control brackets and drilling them.

Next weekend, we primed the control brackets and fitted the control sticks.  Then we attached the platenuts.  Afterwards we worked on the cover ribs.  The center bushing holes ended up a bit larger, 9/16 instead of 7/16, so I am most likely redoing those ribs after checking with Vans.

Firewall

January 26th, Feb 2nd 15h

We started working on the fuselage.  The first part is the firewall.  Which is made from stainless steel. It had very sharp edges, so we needed to be very careful in smoothing the edges.  Then we prepped the firewall and all the stiffeners that attaches to it, matched drilled, deburred, dimpled and counter sink as needed.

The next weekend, we primed and riveted all the parts, except for the aux fuel pump doubler.  We don’t need this part for fuel injected engines. Also, the firewall recess was not riveted for the time being, so that we have access.