Busy day of building today! Started off with a Home Depot run to pick up some paint pots and gloves. Then I got set up and shot all of the elevator part and skins with primer.
That was a lot of stuff to prime. Didn’t mix enough and had to make a second batch to finish the skins.
Once the primer was dry, I brought everything in the house and dimpled the skins and all the ribs, spars, and other miscellaneous parts. Clecoed the forward half of the trim tab hinge to the aft spar and machine countersunk the portion of the aft spar that attaches to the hinge. Did a similar job on the trim tab spar later.
Modified my female #40 dimple die to enable dimpling of the nut plates needed for the trim tab servo doubler. I just ground off a bit of the edge on the bench grinder.
Here’s the modified die in action squeezing a dimple into a nut plate.
And here are the nut plates installed in the doubler.
I machine countersunk the parts of the trim tab pushrod and double flush riveted it together. The plans called out AN426-3-3.5 rivets but those were too short. I used -4.5’s and they came out perfect.
Clecoed together the trim tab with the spar and trailing rdge and final drilled the holes in the closeout tabs.
I machine countersunk the the trailing edges for the trim tab and left elevator using the tapered-pilot countersink cutter. I’m still waiting for the right trailing edge from Van’s to replace the one a screwed up.
I riveted the trim tab horns and spar to the bottom trim tab skin.
Taped off the places on the skins and spar where I’ll bond the ribs and trailing edge in order to prep for the ProSeal and trailing edge tape. I removed the primer with isopropyl. I scuffed with 150 grit sandpaper. Then cleaned the scuffed areas with acetone. Then I removed the tape.
Tomorrow will be my first experience with ProSeal. I’ll be using it to glue the trim tab ribs in place. Plans call for a “well and truly flat” work surface on which to weight down the trim tab while the ProSeal sets up. I don’t consider my workbenches to be “well and truly flat.” So I’ll be off to Home Depot again tomorrow to come up with something. Maybe a steel plate or a 3/4″ MDF panel?
| Today’s Time (hours): | 9.0 |
| Empennage Time (hours): | 100.0 |
| Total Time (hours): | 100.0 |
Ron's RV-14A Build Log 