Another hiatus...  This time, from this blog.  Still working on the RV-10!!  Tail cone is all riveted.  The oldest mini me helped with the rest of the riveting.  Its starting to look like an airplane now.  This is a big milestone in my book. 

Now it's time for the empennage attach which is in progress.  The elevators have been fitted to the H.S. I'm stuck on actually putting the H.S. on the tail cone though.  I'm missing the raw material to fabricate 2 shims.  Instead of ordering one part, I'm skipping ahead to the elevator trim section mount.

Started the elevator trim mount and stop short again since it's calling out for odd drill bits that did not come with the Cleaveland Tool Kit.  So have a small list of tools I need to order now from Cleaveland including their static port kit.  Although the tried and true rivet head static port Vans recommends, the consensus is it is very flimsy and delicate if messed with after install.   The latest version of the Cleavland Static ports have been accurate as reported by past builders.   Its a much more substantial piece that looks really sturdy AND nice.  The tubing and fittings are superior in quality with quick disconnects. 

Mean while, I have been planning the wing kit order.  So far the plan for the wing build:

Standard build
Gretz Mast
3/4" conduit in each wing
Deluxe Fuel Caps
Duckswoth Leading Edge Light in each wing
OAT Probe
Unsure of wing tip lights at this point.
1 quart of proseal.  (1qt on hand)

For now...  I'm working ALOT to save up for the wing kit.

Stay tuned.

Hiatus...


Its been over two months since my last  update.  Other projects (aquaponics) need my attention.  The RV got ZERO attention during that hiatus.  The break ended 2 days ago...

With the tail cone assembled and clecoed, it was time to start riviting.  The first parts to be rivited are the J stiffners to the skin using 426-3-3.5 rivits.  Boy, I was really nervous riviting for the first time after 2 months on the final assembly of the tail cone.  YIKES!! Well, low and behold, the first 4-5 rivits were bent over.  I didn't fret about it since I expected it.  I also didn't fully rivit to not expand the holes.  After those initial bad rivits, all the others went in smoothly and perfect. 

I recruited the admiral to help buck the center portion of the foward tail cone floor.  I couldn't reach that area at all over the side skins.  We made a good team riviting the floor.  She bent over one rivit close to a bulkhead that she had a hard time squaring off the tungten bucking bar.  I drilled out the 5 or 6 rivets that were bad and reset those with a -4 rivet.  All rivets were check with the gauge and all were good.  Great confidense booster this was. 

Next, I need to rivet the bulkheads to the skins...  No pictures unfortunatley since I didn't want any distractions during the process due to the hiatus.  I'll take some shots next time out though.

Thanks for following...

Till next time...

10 days has gone by since I posted something to the blog.  Thats all that has stopped though.  The build has continued VERY strong.  I'm afraid though that the empennage will be totally complete (including fiberglass) before the wings arrive.  I'll be on the look out for unbuilt wings in the classifieds.  If you know of anyone with RV-10 untouched wing kit, let me know.  I'm looking for a bargain to start wings sooner, otherwise, I'll just continue to save up for the kit from Vans Aircraft. 

Since the last post, The longerons, aft deck, top skins and seat belt brackets were clecod, and match drilled.  With that, came the dissasembly, and deburring of all parts.  The dissasembly is so depressing, lol.  Its exciting to see a huge part being built but then it all comes apart, ugh!  The kids came in one night and asked where the tail cone went.  My daughter thought I stuck it up in the attic.  "No honey, I took it apart."  "Why?"  "The instructions says to take it apart to prepart for final assembly."  "Oh ok."  

Took me 3 days to fully deburr all parts, sand and countersink a few parts.  Those were VERY long days.  A minmum of 10 hours a day, MINIMUM.  Deburring and sanding was extremely tedius.  Only when I got to the last part, a skin, did I need a break.  The though of deburring what seemed like a million holes instantly drained my energy tank.  After a 1hr break doing other things around the house, I was instantly reenergized and finishd the deburring and sanding. 

Next was to dimple and countersink some parts.  I opted to not dimple until after priming.  The dimples make priming (and sanding) a bit more difficult for an even coat.  Ended the night at 2230 after priming all parts.  After bringing all the parts inside at night, I noticed the 8 footish longerons standing up nice and tall by the garage side door, unprimed, ugh!  The next day I was sent home from work early.  I mixed up a small batch of AKZO and sprayed the longerons and touched up a few other parts.  Carmella and Benico wanted to help do some riveting today so after riveting the bellcrank bearing assembly, they helped find rivets, nutplates, and asembly parts by part number.  This is the first time they see parts being riveted together.  They helped place rivtes in holes where needed.  We have another riveting session planned for tonight.  Yesterday we riveted the battery tray.  Tonight we will start with the tiedown bulkhead assembly (had to skip to battery tray since one of the angles were not primed ether, primed it with the longerons). 

Check out the time lapse videos of the last 10 days.  Also don't forget to check out the rest of the videos on my you tube channel and post your questions, suggestions, or comments.  Your input would be greatly appreciated. 

 

 

Tail Cone 3

 

 

Tail Cone 4

 

 

Tail Cone 5



Another day full of match drilling.  Finished match drilling the right side. Flipped the cone right side up.  Clecod the aft bottom skin along with the two rear most bulkheads.   This last two bulkheads were really a tight fit. Next the left stiffners and fling went in. This skin was easier than the right. It might have been easier because I had a game plane after doing the right side. Straight forward, no different than the right side. Baggage stiffner went in too.

A lot of today was wasted on trying to cool the garage.  Todays heat index was at least 100 degrees F. Bought a 14000 btu portable AC a couple nights ago because the central ac took a dump.  After getting the central ac fixed. ( I replaced the capacitor 50 bucks )  I decided to give the portable ac in the garage a try. It dropped the temp in the garage by 2 degrees and 2% humidity after 4 hours!!   Needless to say, it was useless.  I returned it and replace it with a 12000 BTU window unit.   Big difference!! It dropped the humidity from 66% to 49% and temp from 88 to 82 in a couple hours.  A couple more hours and the temp was down to 79.   Temp was set for 79. With the humidity at 49%, this was very comfortable.  This is the biggist unit that would fit the window.  If I find this to still not be sufficient then a split unit will replace the window unit.  Plan on adding attic foil to the attic first though.

It is difficult to work on the build or anything for that matter in the garage when your sweaty and hot as early as 9am.

Any how,  stay tuned for more building!!!!

Today officially starts the start of the tail cone.  Up to this point, I worked on bits and pieces for the tail cone section.  Mainly the fabrication of parts from raw materials.  Because of all those parts had already been fabricated prior today on downtime from the elevators, the tail cone got a big head start.  Started off by pulling out the SUV from the garage (hopefully temporarily until the elevator trailing edges are cured, riveted, off the workbench, and stored).

Vans sent me new 8' J channels a few days ago so today I cut them to the dimensions called out in the plans and deburred.  Next I cut the Cleaveland Tool tie down to size on the band saw and deburred it smooth.  Then I had to come up with a way to lay the bottom skin on to start the assembly process.  Didn't have any saw horses so used a narrow folding table spaced away enough to lay the bottom skin between it and the work bench.   Bulkheads clecoed.  The bottom 3 stiffeners were slid into place, match drilled and clecoed into place.  Next the right side 3 stiffeners were slid into place followed by the right skin.  The right skin was a royal pain in the rear to get the first cleco into each bulkhead.  Really sweated some nuts doing those in the garage.  Glad that was over with.  After the first cleco on each bulk heads were in, then the rest was easy to cleco.  Next was match drilling the right side stiffeners to the skin.  I'm about 95% done with match drilling the stiffeners to the side skin.  My central AC took a dump.  House had not cooled in several hours so I had to stop at about 8pm to investigate.  Turns out the a/c compressor fan capacitor is seems to be toast.  The fan spins only when I kick start the fan.  Back to the RV...I only had maybe 10 more holes to match drill!  errrrr. 

 Here is the time lapse video of today's progress.

Elevator rear spar riveted using RV-10 empennage bucking bar (nice!).  Pop riveted the rib halves. Front spar riveted.  The skins were riveted to the spars.  Trailing edge and foam ribs were bonded and weighted down.  Counter weights attached.  Left trim tab foam ribs were bonded, skin clecoed,  Trim tab placed into the wedge blocks.  Waiting for the bonding to cure before messing with the elevator and trim tab.  Need to order a a new right trim tab skin and spar.  

Here is  a quick time lapse of todays events.

After work today, I finished riveting the the rib halves, and attached the rear spars to the ribs and skins.  Used the RV-10 elevator bucking bar from Cleveland Tools.  When used as instructed in the plans, it works very nicely.  I found clamping the skin to the work bench at the front of the elevator using the wood to protect the skin was even better.  Otherwise, the elevator would move around and rivets weren't as nice.  Here is a quick time lapse of todays work.