THE FLAP AND AILERON GAPS
It is time to get focused on finishing up these wings. It is fairly difficult to make excuses when the wings come over 90% built already. I have been spending a fair piece of time continuing to work on design aspects, wire runs, and things like that. It is becoming quite real that I will be sealing up these wings at some point. Once they are sealed, I will lose easy access to all of these internal components for good. I have spent more than enough time agonizing over this. The time has come to get the job done. First up, the flap and aileron gaps.
This was actually quite easy. It was reminiscent of “the good ol’ days” when you took a piece of aluminum, clecoed it to another, and match drilled away. No surprises here. Just good clean match drilling fun. I don’t have a picture of it, but I went ahead and did this for the right wing as well. This is an easy step to do when the wing is either still in the cradle or on a work table. It was easier in the cradle, but perfectly manageable on the work table.
SETTING UP AND MATCH DRILLING J-CHANNEL
This step is jumping ahead a bit since I will not be closing up the wings soon. I want to prime all of the internal parts at once. I need to create the J-channel pieces and have them match drilled with the skins in order to do this. This step is identical to creating the J-channel stringers for the tailcone. Cut to length, debur, mark a center line. Thankfully there are only two to make this time instead of all that the tailcone required.
The drilling was tedious work, but I put on a good podcast, put my head down, and got to work. It is amazing how quickly I can forget my own rules about the disposable nature of drill bits. Do yourself a favor and have plenty of #40 bits on hand. They are relatively inexpensive and worth throwing away once dull.
- Total time today – 3 hours
- Total time wings – 16.5 hours
- Total time aircraft – 224.5 hours