Saturday May 21, 2022
Misc Riveting, Wheels Installed
(1.0 Hours Center Fuselage, 3.8 Hours Landing Gear)
4.8 Hours Total

Been busy with work and travel for the last few weeks. The LP4-3 rivets came from Van's. I riveted the brace to the roll bar.

And I riveted the cover on the left side.

Then, I riveted the support brackets for the canopy latch lever to the side skins.

I ordered this aluminum putty a while back and mixed a little bit up to experiment with. There was a bit of a step up between the two pieces of canopy deck on the right side, so I put some there.

There were a couple of unused prepunched holes in the canopy skin that I filled as well.

Then, I packed the wheel bearings with grease using the "Handypacker", which makes the job significantly less messy.

I unbolted one of the wheel assemblies.

And got out one of the tires and a tube.

I dusted the inside of the tire and the outside of the tube with talc. Then, I put the tube in the tire and inflated it slightly to make sure the tube didn't get pinched in between the wheel halves.

Here is the wheel bolted together and inflated to 25 psi.

Then, I did the other wheel.

Here's a wheel bolted in place. I had to slightly sand the axle with some fine grit to get the bearing to slide on.

Looking so cool!

In the afternoon, I worked on drilling the holes in the axle for the cotter pin from the axle nut.

I used the holes in the axle nut as a guide and it went very smoothly. Nice and straight.

Right side done. I'm going to wait to bend the cotter pin, because I assume these wheels will have to come off again at some point.

And the left side.

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