Saturday September 16, 2006
HS Riveting
(4.6 Hours Horizontal Stabilizer, 1.7 Hours Vertical Stabilizer)
6.2 Hours Total

Today I riveted the rear spar stiffeners and rear spar hinge brackets to the rear HS spar. I then went to bolt the center hinge bearing to the rear spar with my spiffy new torque wrench. It quickly became obvious that I didn't know how to properly use the torque wrench and I broke the first bolt. I was much more careful on the second bolt and noticed the subtle "release" when the proper torque limit was reached. So I ordered a replacement bolt from Spruce.

I then started working on the HS front spar. The rivets called out to rivet the front spar stiffeners to the front spar are a bit long and it was quite challenging to get the shop heads straight. In the end, the shop heads are all ok, but they won't win any awards for straightness. I started to see about riveting the ribs to the front spar, but I'm going to need some help bucking some of those.

At this point I moved on to the VS. I got the rear spar, doubler, and hinge brackets assembled. Then I tried to figure out what is supposed to happen with the non-existant lower 2 holes in the lower-most hinge bracket. The instructions and plans are contradictory. I want to research this point a bit before I start riveting the VS.

The riveting process isn't really difficult, but it does take a significant investment of time. Two rivets had to be drilled out--I forget what the problems were, but the drilling process didn't really enlarge the holes so I just did them over. I spent over 6 hours working on this today and don't have a whole lot to show for it. My dad is gonna help me shoot those rivets on the HS tomorrow, but I'm going to have to wait for the new bolt before I can finish it.

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