Countersinking Rudder trailing edge wedge

Prepping the rudder has gone fast the last couple days and I'm ready to countersink the rudder wedge. However, it is really pretty thin and I'm worried that if I countersink enough to make a dimpled piece fit flush into the countersink, then I will almost be countersinking all the way through the wedge since I have to c.s. both sides of it.

Am I needlessly worrying? Should I countersink less than I otherwise would?

Thanks,
Steve

Same task on a 7A

I am at the same place Steve is but with a 7A so I will be interested in your responses to his question. I would assume the methodology would be the same for both. I expect to rivet this closed by the weekend.

I just finished mine over the weekend, turns out it wasn't as big a problem as I expected, I did it with a cordless and a cage. just started out easy and adjusted the stop in increments. Fit fine. Sorta like rolling the leading edge of the rudder skins, I spent all kinds of windshield time doing that in my mind, and it turned out to simple too. Just take your time..

A simple little jig will help

Here is the jig I made to help with CS'ing the wedges. It worked out really good. There is a write up on the Aileron page of my web site.

It might help to mount it on your drill press, which I did not do but still had good results.

Countersinking the wedges

Steve,

To answer your questions, yes, you'll countersink all the way through. Not by much but a little. And, yes, you're worrying too much. In the plans somewhere Van's mentions that you'll probably open the hole up a little when you countersink the second side of the wedge and they say not to worry about it. I don't have the manual in front of me to cite the referrence but its there.

Don 90702 Fuselage (should finish the bulheads tonight and start making my canoe very shortly)

Thanks for the suggestions

Last night I built a jig, much like the one Bill suggested above, though his idea of resting the wedge you are countersinking on top of some scrap wedge was too simple--I had to come up with something more complicated!

I found that by cutting about 12-13 degrees off the edge of a 2x4 I could get the wedge flat with the countersink cage. I then attached that angled 2x4 to another 2x4 to support the wedge against (and to provide a wider base to set on the drill press table) and also drilled a large hole down through the middle to allow the countersink cage full travel. It looks like it should work quite well--we'll see tonight after work.

Thanks again to all who have provided suggestions over a number of questions the past couple weeks. The learning curve (even after taking a builder class) has been pretty steep, but it has been a lot of fun.

Steve