Tomorrow I’m planning to attach the two halves of the fuselage. This will be a big step, and it’s exciting to be at this point! My friend Simon is coming over to help me with the alignment of the parts which I’ve heard can be tricky.
Tonight I got ready for that step by rearranging the garage, and completing a few final tasks. I removed the temporary rivets holding the skins and ribs of the forward fuselage, along the trailing edge. I also bent two of the flanges of the aft fuse per the plans, and set up some safety straps, suspended from the rafters.
Forward and aft fuselage parts spend their last night alone
Last night and tonight I worked on the air vents, installing them in the cockpit tonight.
The vents (SV-6) arrived from Vans on Friday, so I got to work positioning, match drilling, and trimming the parts per the plans.
I installed some aluminum honeycomb in the vent to stop any large insects or other critters from getting access through the vent shaft. This worked out ok, and I feel slightly better knowing there is something to act as a barrier.
Aluminum honeycomb product used for screening the vent shaftSilicone used to bond everything together. A cutout of the aluminum honeycomb. This was glued inside the vent shaft to stop FOD coming in the vent.Assembled and match drilledTrimming the vent per the plans. One corner is rounded.Carefully clamping them into positionClamped into position. Waiting for the silicone bonding agent to dry
Tonight I filled some unnecessary nutplate holes with rivets, in the bottom of the fuselage. I had been puzzling over how to river these, and decided to back river them. That worked ok, except for one right by the spar, where I can’t get in snugly enough with the rivet gun to rivet straight. The ribs and spar flanges get in the way. I’m thinking I’ll pop rivet these, vs risking damage to the spar.
The nutplates are for the tricycle version, and hold the gear leg fairings.
Tonight I trimmed and sanded the air vents, and separated and deburred the aluminum brackets. I found scotch-brite worked best to scuff the plastic.
I can’t do more on this until the eyeball vents arrive from Vans, and I’m not sure on their ETA right now.
Vents and bracketsHolding in place, this is view from outsideView from inside cockpit. There is zero clearance between the panel and the vent, will check this again once I have the eyeball in hand.
I finished reviewing all of the Quickbuild sections today. I didn’t find anything wrong, just some missing torque seal on a couple of bolts under the roll bar bottom bracket. I noted it down and will torque and seal them
I installed a couple of extra shop lights in the garage to improve the lighting situation. It’s already excellent, but I had the extra lights and there were a couple of slightly darker spots. Now it’s very bright!
The next step is installing the cabin air vents, so I found the parts, and then ordered a few things I needed. Vans doesn’t sell the plastic ball vents anymore, so I bought the aluminum vents instead. They are apparently far superior, with a better seal. They are $140 each, so I’m expecting them to be great! I also ordered some more silicone adhesive, my existing tube is old and has gone off.
Tonight I started going over the Quickbuild fuse kit, starting with chapter 25.
I spent some time familiarizing myself with the overview then carefully stepped through the instructions checking the work.
Everything looks ok. I found some damage on the outboard edges of the main spar on each side. It looks like tie down strap scratches from shipping, and can probably be buffed out. I emailed Vans support since this is a very important structural part, and I will need to remove some small amount of material to repair.
My new garage setup is looking good and I’m almost ready to start building again. Everything in the garage is on wheels except for some storage racks in one corner. I’m planning to make up some storage bins for nuts, bolts and washers, but other than that I’m ready to start. My goal is to be back into the swing of things by the end of next week.
New garage. No built-in cabinets, but slightly more space than the last garage.
Sometime in June, Stuart Transport arrived and picked up my wings and fuselage, shipping them back to Vans. With those out of the garage, the remaining parts were relatively easy to pack and stow into a 20 foot U-Haul.
Aft fuse and all the boxes of hardware and some tools enroute to San Diego
I built a wooden crate with shelving for the tail feathers. I lined it with blankets, and used shrink-wrap to secure the parts to the racks. That worked out well, and I am going to put wheels on it and keep it as a storage rack in the new garage. hardware and small parts were wrapped and stored in cardboard boxes. The horizontal stabilizer went into my wing cart, and was strapped firmly against the cart, and the cart against the wall of the truck. I temporarily installed the forward-most bulkhead in the aft fuse, using clecos to secure it in place. Then I set the aft sure on the dolly I had built for my Quickbuild fuselage. I cut some foam strips which ran on the dolly lengthwise to help support the curvature of the bottom of the fuselage. Then I used shrinkwrap to secure the aft fuse to the dolly.
After a 12 hour drive, we arrived at the new house, and everything was still very secure. Unloading was uneventful, but space was limited due to the ongoing construction happening on the house.
Parts stored in the new garage
A few weeks later my new fuselage arrived from Vans, which prompted some cleanup and rearranging in the garage. It’s good to have the new fuse now, it looks great and primer is definitely heavier and looks more like I would have expected.
As far as I can tell, all my parts and tools have made it with no noticeable damage.
