March 31, 2020
The replacement rudder stiffener came in the mail today, so we cut that out, trimmed it up, took it to the wheel and primed it. It installed pretty easy with the back riveting set and that finished up the rudder skins until we prime everything for final assembly.
The elevator skins were an entirely different story. Most of the rivets went in ok, but the front rivet or two up in the bend were very hit or miss. It took both of us with the back riveting set to get them to sit flush, and we ended up with more than 1 oops rivet.
Paul held the gun and did the riveting while I leaned into the piece with a dead blow hammer to attempt to hold it flat and flush against the back rivet plate. When you hold the upper skin out of the way in order to fit the gun in, the bottom skin flexes up and off the table and leaves a gap for the rivet to back out.
These things kicked our asses, but once again, after a few redo’s we ended up with a decent looking outside and shop heads that were more than acceptable from a strength standpoint, even if a few of them were Oops rivets.
-Paul
(Total Build Time: 100.5 hrs)