1.4 Hours -
This evening, I decided to spend some time in the garage with the RV project. There were a couple of things that didn’t quite get finished during my last work session, so I wanted to get those done.
The first outstanding item was to finish mounting the pitot mast in the left wing. The first thing I did was cut the forward flange of the pitot mast so that it would not overlap the row of rivets in the main spar that attach the leading edge. I only had to remove about 1/8″, and the bandsaw, followed by a few passes with a vixen file, made quick work of that. I checked the fit and it was perfect, so it was time to drill.
The mast attaches to the wing by three rivets in the forward spar and two rivets through just the skin. I held the mast in place while I slowly drilled the first hole using the holes in the skin and spar as a guide. Once drilled, I clecoed and moved on to the next one. After the three spar holes were drilled, I used the paper template that came with the mast to mark the locations of the two holes that will go through the skin and the mast on the aft portion of the mast. Once marked and punched, these holes were also drilled to #40. Other than some dimpling/countersinking, the pitot mast is now ready. However, before it is riveted, I’ll have to figure out how I’m attaching the pitot tube to the mast. This will be much easier to do on the bench than on the wing.
Here's a picture of the SafeAir1 pitot mast after shaving off some of the inboard and forward flanges and drilling all the rivet holes.
The picture is a little out of focus, but it shows the pitot mast positioned just outboard the bellcrank and clecoed to the wing skin.
The next task was to finish prepping the right bottom outboard skin. My Dad had deburred all the holes already, so all I had to do was deburr the edges and dimple all the holes. I deburred the edges using a Scotchbrite wheel on my die grinder. This makes quick work of smoothing the edges, but it can take material off too fast if I’m not paying attention!
Once the edges were deburred, I used my squeezer to dimple all the holes that it could reach. The remaining holes had to be dimpled with the c-frame. Once all of the holes were dimpled, I scuffed the rivet lines on the inside surface of the skin, cleaned it, and primed with some NAPA 7220. On to the next, and final, skin!
Another bad picture...mainly because I'm in it...but I have to keep the FAA happy by showing that I actually built this beast!
Everyone's favorite...a picture of a freshly primed part. This is the right bottom inboard wing skin.
