Better late.....................

It's overtime for an update. Friends, no posting does not mean no action. I have excuses, but will keep those to myself. this post will update a few (part) days of building. It chronicles  a fair part of the assembly of the tailcone. The final preparatory part of the rear bulkhead assembly was to attach the bushing and hinge brackets called out in this section of the plans

This is followed by test fitting the rear bulkhead to the stabilator assembly incorporating selection of the appropriate washers to ensuire a good fit. This was completed with only a minor wrestle of the tiny washers into place, assisted  by the judicious application of super glue to hold said washers where they should be.

The preparatory work now complete, attention now turns to the assembly of the tailcone. It could just be that this will herald the first identification of the project as something approaching the look of an aircraft part. We shall see. This is the laying out of the first of the skins (bottom - the  assembly is upside down at this point).
You can see here the three tailcone ribs attached to the bottom skins with the left bottom skin clecoed in place.

Here with the bottom and left and right bottom skins riveted in place.

Paul turned up at this point and helped with the clecoing and riveting of the side skins. The whole assembly was turned the right way up and some strings run to assist the later installation of the control cables, very difficult once the tailcone is closed up, unless the strings are available to pull them through.

Here the novice master builder is running and affixing wires that control the trim mechanism
 

As shown here the wire protrudes the required distance from the rear bulkhead assembly (now clecoed in place), later to be connected to the motorised trim mechanism

 
I thought this looked like an outstandingly good (and simple) effort. Later that evening I was browsing the Vans forum and discovered that other builders have provided advice that there is a right and wrong way to install this wire, the connector pins need to be at the front end. Strangely the otherwise comprehensive building plans are silent on this point. With a 50/50 chance of stuffing this up, I repaired to the shed and cautiously removed the tape evident on the end of the wires shown above. Sure enough - pins! I'm going to need to remove a number of cable ties and reverse the wire. Fortunately I have yet to put the top skins in place so I have access to do this. No drama.

Blissfully ignorant of this at the time, Paul and I  pressed ahead with the clecoing and riveting. It was great to have help with this, it's amazing how quickly it goes with two on the job. 

So this is the current  state of play. The affixing of the top skin, a stiffener and the fixing plate as shown below will complete the tailcone section of the build. 



I think it's progressing well given the competing demands for construction time and given that construction only  began on May 26th. This is fun - and very satisfying.