It seems like a long time since the last post - and it is. There is some progress to report but I have to say that the paying job and other activities continue to have an adverse impact on activity in the ACF.
The tailcone is all but complete. I finished riveting the skins in place and prepared and riveted the Forward Skin Rib to the tops skin.
Here is the completed fuselage cone.
I have decided to deviate from the order of build as have many others and delay the attachment of the empennage to the tailcone as is called out in the order of build. This is due in the main to the lack of storage space for the tailcone plus empennage. I did have a dip into Section 11 (Empennage Attachment) though in order to attach the fibreglass fairings to the rudder and to the vertical stabilizer assemblies. This proved to be relatively easy with some trimming of the fibreglass accomplished with the aid of the trusty Dremel tool with cutting disk and sandpaper over both rectangular and round configuration sanding blocks. Here they are cleoced in place and test fitted ready for riveting.
After riveting these in place I decided to attack the construction of the Pushrod Assembly. This involves a 12 volt servo unit attached to a rod which when finally installed will connect with the anti-servo tabs and provide elevator trim capability in fight by adjusting elevator control pressure. It gets installed at the same time as the empennage, now a way down the track. The servo unit wiring is also connected to the wiring that is currently protruding from the rear of the tailcone. I would have installed the connectors to the wiring on both, but I need to acquire a much better crimping tool. It's incredible how this plane building provides the perfect excuse to populate the tool kit with new and better goodies.
Oh yes, and the (later) fitting of the pushrod assembly requires among other things the fabrication of a couple of spacers carefully cut from the provided 5/16 aluminum tubing. This makes perfect sense, save that I don't have sufficient aluminum tubing left as a consequence of a miss-cut in an earlier process. I feel an order from Oregon coming on. I'm thinking about what else I need to order to minimise the pain of heavy freight cost for a part that weighs about the same as a couple of ball-point pens.
Onwards and upwards, its time start on the wings or specifically one wing as I don't have space to build them both at the same time, which I'm sure in an ideal world would make a whole lot of sense. I spent a happy hour or two sorting the hardware - nuts, bolts, rivets etc. etc. into labelled bins so that they are easily found when needed. This instead of sorting throgh numerous of the ubiquitous Vans paper bags.I then proceeded to unload the parts stored in the crate in which they arrived, and stacked them in sub-kits in shelving adjacent to the construction table. The skins stay in the crate, safe and sound until needed.
I started at the beginning - that would be Step 1 in the plans that requires the separation of some attach angles. I deburred the edges and holes in these, and that folks is the sum of progress to date.
