Some of those days in airplane building are really cool.
It's those days were you start putting things together and suddenly all looks bigger and better.
Eventhough you will be taking things appart again a number of times for deburring, mating, priming,... you know you've reached a new milestone.
In the last sessions, I have been preparing longerons to fit in the tailcone assembly (notching).
As the longerons were ready, I positioned the tailcone on some sawhorses and tried to slip the longeron in the notches in the bulkheads.
This did not go well... (as expected). I read on many sites and learned from buddy builder Hugo that you may have to enlarge the notches in the bulkhead slots in order to be able to comfortably insert the longerons. I got the keyfiles out and started enlarging the slots.
Here is a shot before modification
and the shot after modification with the slot enlarged.
After doing that to all slots, I was finally able to insert the longerons in the tailcone assembly.
This allowed me to verify the fit of the end of the longerons and the notches around the horizontal stabilizer bars. If you messed up, there not really much you can do at this point but
as you see, the longeron fits nicely at the end of F712 bulkhead. The horizontal part of the longeron can not go passed the F712 bulkhead as this is the point where the rear spar of the vertical stabiliser will butt against the web of F712.
The notches also fit nicely within the notched openings in the longerons.
Time for some more fun. I inverted the tail cone and let it rest on two sawhorses as the manual prescribes. Then Inserted the longerons again. Measured where F704 would come relative to the F706 bulkhead and positioned the 3rd sawhorse so F704 could rest on it. Then inverted the center fuselage assembly and clecoed it to the F706 bulkhead. It takes a bit of manoeuvering the tailcone but it's pretty easy to cleco all together. I started with copper clecoes in the baggage ribs to F706 and that made the skin joining easier.
I also found out I forgot to modify the back of one of the baggage ribs where the electricity will run through.
It takes some patience and aligning difficulties, but in the end, the lines match up without pressure on the clecoes.
After that I verified the location of the longerons in relation to the bend down position in F704H. I was quite disappointed at first and took the picture below. The bend in the longeron was clearly not aligned with the position of the bend on the F704H side doubler. (no panic, more on that later)
Next I clecoed the side skins on. First cleco to F705 and F704. Then try to match it all with the tailcone F706.
This looks straightforward but it took quite a bit of time before I got the holes to align well. In the end, found out that the floor in my garage isn't as straight as I expected and the I had to raise the tailcone slightly on one side. About 1cm. This made me doubt if there was no problem in the fuselage (a twist or whatever...)
But common sense kicked in soon... If the holes are predrilled on sideskins and tailcone, and all is clecoed well, how could there be a twist...
I also used the digital level to measure at F704 and F75 bulkhead and all looks straight as hell.
(I had Hugo over to check it all out, just to make sure and he re-affirmed all was just fine)
another cool shot of a big assembly.
Couldn't resist and made another one from the front to back on the inside.
