3.5 Hours -
Today’s work put me past the 400 hour mark on my build. That should put me at about 1/4 done!
I finished the wing cradle today but cutting and installing the reinforcement angles. The angles on the bottom are 24 inches long with 45 degree bevels. The angles going from the main support beam up to the top of the end panels is 28 inches long with 45 degree bevels. I choose these lengths simply so I could keep the bevels at 45 degrees. Even though I’m using a compound miter saw to make the cuts, the simpler the better.
After the reinforcement pieces were attached, I flipped the cradle over and attached castoring wheels to all four corners. I placed one locking wheel on each end just in case.
Next, I cut strips of rubber mesh and stapled them both the spar and leading edge cutouts to act as padding. This material is the same thing that I use to line my tool chest drawers, and I also use it to pad my workbench when I’m working with large parts, like skins, that I want to keep scratch free. The material makes for good padding and it is also very thin. Hopefully, it won’t be too thick and the wings will fit!
The wing cradle skeleton is assembled. I used rubber mesh to line the spar and leading edge cutouts.
Finally, I decided to break down the crate that my wing skins were shipped in and use the long sides of the crate to make a shelf in the middle of the cradle. Breaking down this crate was a real pain due to the number of staples they use to assemble it. The long sides only needed to have about 1/2″ removed to make them fit perfectly in the cradle. To attach the boards to the cradle, I just shot a few nails in with my nail gun. The shelf should give me enough room to store the remaining skins and the wingtips.
I decided to break down the skin box from the wing shipment and use the two long sides as a shelf on the wing cradle. Hopefully there will be enough room to store the wingtips and/or some of the large parts.
Tomorrow, I’ll recruit some help, move the wings from the stands to the cradle and hope they fit!
