Finished Elevator Stiffeners

I finished riveting the stiffeners on the left and right elevators. The picture below is the inside of the right elevator. I haven't been posting much lately but I have been making progress. I always try and do at least something everyday even if it's just reading the plans or straightening up. Next, I'll make a bending brake to bend the trailing edge of the elevators. The plans call for 2 straight 2x8's with door hinges.

Here is the outside of the skin of one of the elevators after riveting the stiffeners. It's really easy to get a smooth rivet with the 3/4 inch plate steel back rivet plate I have.

Pneumatic Squeezer

Here's a new tool in the crib. It's a pneumatic squeezer. A member of Van's Airforce had it for sale at a good price and I was the first to grab it. I've been bidding on ebay for a year and probably bid on 30 of these looking for a steal. It's used but works well. Austin and I dimpled about 30 stiffeners in about 10 minutes. Paula and Shelby even gave it a try. Should be just the ticket to give my sore arm a rest.

RV Grin - First Flight in an RV

I got to fly an RV this weekend! Here's a picture of the plane I flew. That's Norm and his lovely bride.



Norm (he's the Tech Counselor who inspected my plane about a month ago) gave me a ride in the RV-7A that he built. He's an A&P certified mechanic and did a really beautiful job.

We flew for 40 minutes and I did 1 takeoff, 3 touch-and-go's, steep turns and stalls. It had been quite a while since I had flown so I was definitely rusty! I've landed on aircraft carriers and snow covered runways but this was the first time I've landed on a grass strip.

Norm said it would be a motivational flight and it really was. There's clearly a reason why the RV's are such an incredibly popular line of homebuilts. I don't have much small single time but I do have a little flight time in Cessnas and the RV felt like twice the airplane to me. I am certain now that I made the right choice of aircraft to build!

One thing that surprised me was how foreign the EFIS (Electronic Flight Information System) in Norm's RV felt. An EFIS is the computer screen that has replaced most of the older round gauges. I'm comfortable around computers and I've studied the EFIS and thought flying behind one would come naturally but I was wrong. My eyes kept going back to the "steam gauges" that Norm had left as backups. It will definately require some hanger flying to get comfortable with them. Here's an example of a popular EFIS.

Started Elevators

I started on the elevators. Here are the stiffeners being match drilled to the inside of the skins.

Elevator Stiffener Oops

I had a small setback when I trimmed three of the elevator stiffeners too short. I missed note 2 on the blueprints below and trimmed the distance "X" on note 1 from the next to the last hole. Note 2 said the last hole was not drilled until later. Dang! I was initially bummed when I went to order replacements but was happily surprised when the price was only $6.49 for the pack of 4. Way to go Van.

Added Drawers to Workbench

I added drawers to my workbench. The clear shoeboxes weren't working well as toolboxes and I had most of the material for drawers including the slides which are the expensive parts. These seem to be working well so far.