TitleGarrison

No bird ever flew nonstop from New York to Tokyo, or raced 15 miles high at triple the speed of sound.                                                                                                   
  But birds do something else.
  They do not conquer the air; they romance it.
.”

  Peter Garrison

HoursAndCounting

Jur's RV7 Aircraft Factory
2917 hours
and counting
Some decisions in life are bare of any obvious logic

 

UPDATE 11/2016: In the article below, you will see that I rivetted F-729A bellcrank rib to the F-778 bottom skin. Do NOT do this now !
In the enthousiasm of rivetting you tend to do as much as seems possible at the moment. However, you still need to be able to remove the F706 fuselage bulkhead later when mating the center and aft fuselage toghether. You matchdrill, deburr and dimple those lines later. With what I did, I was unable to dimple the skin and 706 bulkhead individually around the center bottom and had to dimple the material squeezed together as I couldn't remove the rib anymore. It's also easier to dimple the second line just behind the F706 if the 706 can still be removed.

 

After a lot of prepping and drilling and priming and cursing about the tail wheel assembly, it's finally fun-time again.

It's rivetting time !

First you rivet the bulkhead lines. Make sure you don't rivet over the line of the middle j-channel. You still have to be able to pull away the upper section to insert the longeron later.

Also rivetted the forward lines of F729A and F728A. It's not a big deal, just a lot of rivets to hammer.

One thing to pay attention about is the rivets on the bulkhead lines. The flanges of the bulkheads are slightly at an angle. to get nice straight and flat rivets, you'll need to keep your bucking bar and an angle too. It  sounds obvious but for some reason, the visual apprearence makes you tend to want to keep the bucking bar straight with the web of the bulkhead. A good tip and trick is to first put your bucking bar flat on the side skin, note the angle you have with the web and move the bucking bar in the same position over the rivet. that guarantees nice rivet heads. I had to drill some out first before I got to that point.

It is also worth using a tungsten bucking bar with an angle on one side. The rivets in the corners near the bulkheads are hard to set with a straight one. 

I am rivetting the aft fuselage upside down. This is much easier then having somebody with the gun on his back all the time. You just have to slide under the aft fuselage and can "easily" buck from the inside. I put easily between quotes because you will notice that after 50 rivets, you won't call it easy anymore. Expect some muscle pain the day after by manoeuvering in all kind of positions inside. It's better here to do multiple sessions of rivetting.

 Oh yeah... this baby is never coming apart again. A very rewarding thought.

I'm stilling trying to get my kids interested in the building process. They start getting at an age where the intrest for mechanical work grows. So I pulled out some scrap parts and did some drilling and deburring and dimpling.

Here's Robin carefully checking alignment on the drill spot.

 And the actual drilling

Deburring... And a little hint on protection and safety. 

Then Matthias dimpled the plate using the squeezer.

That made a perfect practice plate for rivetting to try some rivets with a new rivetting assistant.

After all the bulkheads, shot the long line that attaches bottom and side skin. I did this until the F708 bulkhead. I still have some work on the tail wheel fork mount so I need to make sure I can still slide that in later.

 Side J-channels rivetted also until F708

 An inside look. 

I had spray painted the tail wheel mount before but for some reason (double painting when already dry), I had some paint peeling off.

So I sanded the whole thing again and started all over. This time the result is satisfactory so I can install it now betweene the tail skin and F711 and F712.

 

But that's for the next session.

How to use

Use the kit buttons in the top ribbon bar to see a chronological overview per sub section per kit. For the full chronological article list, see chronological build link in prelude menu here below. The easiest way to lookup information is by typing in some part numbers or keywords using the search option in the ribbon bar

 

Caution !

Some advice on reading my log for fellow builders !

In some articles, I made corrections at later date on the original article to rectify my own stupidities or faults. Read through the entire article if you intend to use my findings/experiences on your own project !

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It’s possible (not likely) that I’m not as smart as I think I am. (Occasionally, I have moments when I know this to be true. Fortunately, the feeling passes quickly.) Although I have tried to make this information as accurate as I can, it is not only possible, but also quite likely, that erroneous and misguided information lurks within these pages. I cannot and do not warrant these pages to be error free and correct. Furthermore, I accept no liability for the use of this (mis)information. And, as many would say, your mileage may vary. If, after reading this, you are intent on proceeding, please be aware that the contents of this site are protected by copyright (copyright © 2011 and 2012). Nonetheless, you may copy this material subject to these two conditions: (1) any information used is for non-commercial purposes, and (2) the source of the material is properly credited. Of course, you may link to any page herein. At some articles, snippets of the plans from Vans are visible. These are for educational and illustrations purposes only and should never be used as plans for part construction or assembly as plans may have changed since the picture was taken and more important they are protected by Copyright by the Vans Aircraft Mothership company.

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