Drilled holes for and installed angle of attack sensor tubing. Also ran wires for pitot heat.
Drilled the rivet holes for all the aileron push tube ends and prepared all the parts for priming.
Primed all the remaining wing parts.
Installed the aileron and flap gap fairings.
Assembled the ADAHRS mounting bracket.
| Today’s Time (hours): | 7.0 |
| Wing Time (hours): | 249.0 |
| Total Time (hours): | 401.0 |
Same drill as the right tank yesterday…
Both tanks are now fully assembled. I’ll give them a few days and then pressure test them to find and seal any leaks. Then I can attach them to the wings and move on to the bottom wing skins and aileron actuation.
| Today’s Time (hours): | 3.0 |
| Wing Time (hours): | 229.0 |
| Total Time (hours): | 381.0 |
Added a bead of tank sealant for the baffle. Clecoed the baffle in place. Riveted the baffle to the ribs and then riveted the z-brackets in place. Then riveted the baffle to the skin.
Installed the fuel drain, the fuel sender, AN fittings, and the fuel cap.
Machine countersunk the holes in the tank attach bracket for #8 screws.
The right tank is now complete and once the sealant has cured, I can pressure test it. Hoping to get the left tank to the same state tomorrow.
| Today’s Time (hours): | 3.0 |
| Wing Time (hours): | 226.0 |
| Total Time (hours): | 378.0 |
Short build session tonight… Got all the nutplates riveted on to the inboard edge of the tank skins.
The sealant is curing up nicely.
I also temporarily installed the fuel senders in order to tweak the float rods to ensure the proper clearances. I’l permanently install them with sealant after I’ve riveted the baffles in place.
| Today’s Time (hours): | 1.0 |
| Wing Time (hours): | 223.0 |
| Total Time (hours): | 375.0 |
Jared came by again today to help out. Thanks, man. You’re the best!
We got the fuel drains, fuel filer and stiffeners re-installed.
Installed the ribs in the right tank.
Made up installed the vent line for the right tank. Added installed the right tank attach bracket and aft inboard rib and filleted everything with sealer. Both tanks are now ready to be closed out with the rear baffle.
I cannot over state what a sticky, smelly, messy process this is. My shop looks like a sealant bomb went off. Every tool I own has some sealant on it now.
| Today’s Time (hours): | 10.0 |
| Wing Time (hours): | 222.0 |
| Total Time (hours): | 374.0 |
Sealed and riveted the J channel stiffener to the tank skin.
Installed the tank attach bracket assembly and added a fillet of sealant to the seam with the forward rib. I used an inspection mirror to ensure I got good coverage.
Made up the fuel vent line and installed into the tank.
Sealed and riveted the aft inboard tank rib in place. I installed the bulkhead fitting for the vent line and connected the vent line to it.
I didn’t have enough sealant left to fillet the aft rib. So I’ll do that in the next session.
| Today’s Time (hours): | 3.0 |
| Wing Time (hours): | 205.0 |
| Total Time (hours): | 357.0 |
Jared cam over and helped with tanks today. I’m very grateful to have a friend that has done this before and is so generous with his time. I would never have made as much progress on my own. Learned a ton today.
Everything we did today involved fuel tank sealant. We used FlameMaster Chem Seal that I bought from Van’s. This stuff was invented by satan to torture builders. It smells like ass. It is incredibly sticky and gets on everything. Every part, every tool, every cleco, your hands, you arms, the work bench, the floor, EVERYTHING! I went through an entire box of nitrile gloves today. It is a two-part concoction that you mix ten to one by weight.
We sealed and riveted the flanges to the rear inboard ribs. Then we riveted the drain flange to the skins (after undimpling the holes that I accidentally dimpled in the skins). We riveted the fuel filler flanges to the skins. We riveted the stiffeners to the skins. We set up the left skin in the cradles, applied the sealant to the skins and then riveted the ribs in place.
| Today’s Time (hours): | 9.0 |
| Wing Time (hours): | 202.0 |
| Total Time (hours): | 354.0 |
Riveted bottom skin to the right spar and riveted the top and bottom main ribs together.
Prepped the trailing edge extrusions and applied VHB tape to both sides. Clecoed in place and removed the backing. After the tape set up, I lightly set rivets with the squeezer then back riveted double flush.
Ailerons are complete. This completes all of the control surfaces on the airplane.
My replacement fuel tank skins should be here Thursday. Hoping to get the tanks assembled next weekend.
| Today’s Time (hours): | 3.0 |
| Wing Time (hours): | 189.0 |
| Total Time (hours): | 341.0 |
Dimpled the leading and trailing edge holes in the top and bottom skins as well as the holes in the main ribs attached to them. Dimpled all the holes in the leading edge skins as well as the spars.
Machine countersunk the trailing edges.
Riveted the skins to the nose ribs.
Blind riveted the spars to the nose ribs.
Riveted the top and bottom skins to the nose assembly of the left aileron. Riveted the top and bottom ribs together. Riveted the nose skin to the counterbalance.
Prepared the left trailing edge by wiping it down the alcohol and applied the VHB tape to both sides. Then set it in place in the aileron and weighted everything down while resting the edge on a piece of angle iron. I remove the top backing tape by working my way across the aileron by removing a handful of clecos peeling the tape then replacing them with the next handful of clecos down the line until the whole backing tape was removed. I let the tape set up for a while and repeated the process for the bottom.
While the VHB tape sets up on the left aileron, I got started on assembling and riveting the right aileron. Got as far as riveting the top skin in place.
| Today’s Time (hours): | 6.0 |
| Wing Time (hours): | 185.5 |
| Total Time (hours): | 397.5 |
Finished back riveting the stiffeners and ribs to the skins. Which kinda turned into a fiasco when I realized that the holes that match up to the spars on the forward edges of the top skins are not symmetrical span-wise. Once you’ve dimpled the top skins, there is a left and a right skin. Wish I had known this before riveting the left ribs to the right skins and vise versa. So I drilled out the 32 rivets holding the ribs to the skins and re-riveted correctly. Lost about an hour and a half but no damage done.
Once I got past all that, I assembled the ailerons and they’re now ready to have their trailing edges final drilled.
| Today’s Time (hours): | 2.5 |
| Wing Time (hours): | 179.5 |
| Total Time (hours): | 391.5 |
Ron's RV-14A Build Log 