Fuselage longeron riveting

I know there are keeper rivets that get riveted before the "canoe" is flipped, but are there any side skin to longeron rivets that can be completely riveted somewhere forward of those locations?

Bob Collins said:

I know there are keeper rivets that get riveted before the "canoe" is flipped, but are there any side skin to longeron rivets that can be completely riveted somewhere forward of those locations?

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Bob:

I'm working on this right now. I'm building a tip-up, so I can rivet from just forward of the F-705 to the forward side skin bulkhead (sorry, I'm at work and don't have the drawings right here...so I can't tell you the number...it's the bulkhead that goes over the aux longeron and side skin stiffener and attaches at the lower longeron and upper longeron).

If you look at the big drawing of rivet callouts for the skins (again, don't know the number) you can see what you can rivet now. You can also set all the rivets in the back where the aft deck goes.

All the best,
Jamie

Yup, exactly as Jamie said. Basically from F-705 to the subpanel and along the aft deck.

Look at the drawings with all of the skin rivet callouts. Make sure you're looking at the skins for the correct canopy. (In fact, I crossed out the slider canopy skins so I didn't accidentally refer to the wrong ones.) Wherever you don't see a top skin overlapping the longeron, you can rivet.

Dave

Yeah, I did look at the rivet callouts, I just wasn't sure the fact the rivets are called out means I can do them NOW. There's a few mistakes on that DWG (calling for rivets where clearly there are bolts are one) so I don't have complete faith in the DWG.

True. The drawings are more reliable than the instructions, but they do contain some errors. Dan's site does a good job of pointing out the major errors.

Another option is to pull out the 3 (for tip-up) top skins. You'll be getting them out soon anyway. You don't have to cleco them down completely. Laying them over the top, you'll see which holes need to be left open along the longeron.

Riveting the side skins to the longeron makes the fuselage look much more finished. It's a fun step.