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Status Report: #6 That report is about:
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 The Horizontal Stabilizer is by far the most complex structure we have been working on so far. It consists of three types of ribs and has the longest spars we ever touched so far. Oh, and yes, its wing structure reminds you that the thing you building is actually a plane.  The spar of HS is a pretty important part of the plane. It makes all the balance working: it takes the counter weight of the engine, and cause that one is really heavy, so the forces that work here are also pretty serious. There is about a gazillion of different holes on that spars, and they are there for the spar to be reinforced with the doubler and in-spar caps, and it also has the ribs integrated into that eventually. So the work there should be done with a serious attention to the details. One wrong drill and you are off the road.  The assembly of the internal web is pretty cool, it's the first time we meet such a various types of methods to reinforce the construction. In addition to the usual doubler plates on a the spar, we also have stringers to keep the long ribs solid and caps on the spar flanges to add some mass there.  Hundreds of holes to countersink and dimple so all the rivets will be hidden and will keep the aerodynamics. As you doing tens and later hunderds of those guys, you got some confidence and the work flows up quickly. We had to constantly remind ourselves that one wrong move and we would have to order new parts.  That all leads us here: Horizontal Stabilizer in all its beauty, small wings that are almost ready to be painted and installed on the plane. Almost there but not yet there, and still watching it assembled was really making my day. The preparation of the Horizontal Stabilizer for Strontium coating took us about: 26 hours of 4 hands work. Yeap, 2 of us means 4 hands ;-) . Anyway, 52 man-hours and we are there.
 The story of the various painting days is pretty similar: you do all your preparations and place the various parts in good positions to make it more convenient to coat them. The guys that follow our story, probably remember that last time we did the painting we seriously damaged the skin of the Vertical Stabilizer ? so serious that we had to order a new one. Vans acted very quickly here and before our second coating day we got the new part. A bit preparation, and the new part is also painted with the other 2 skins of the Horizontal Stabilizer.  One more interesting point to mention: in that picture we have a small gauge that helps us to measure the exact thickness of the coating layer. If you are looking for one, remember you have to find a device for non-magnetic metals as aluminum will not work with the standard simple devices. The spec of Strontium says 20-30 microns will do: we made it a bit thicker but still in the limits to keep it elastic so it will stay on the metal for very long time. .
It is very inspiring for us to see us making it while the complexity of the assembly is raising up. I believe that with the time that trend will continue to be the same, as well as our ability to make it. Now the parts of the Vertical Stabilizer, the Horizontal Stabilizer and the Rudder are totally ready for the final assembly, and we are totally ready to start the final riveting stage. Join us there.  Cheers. Roman & Dima |
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Status Report: #7 That report is about:
That time our report is very heavy in achievements and we are super happy to put it here. Let's go and see it step by step: .
 Lets admit it, not every moments in the garage are energetic and effective, sometimes you make mistakes and desperately looking for some motivational boost. We want the walls to radiate aviation, we want to have our goal in front of the eyes all the time. If you remember clearly what you want to achieve, it keeps you extremely motivated and highly energetic. Alex came to our place once and ask us: "Hey do you want me to put some planes on the wall for you?", apparently he was doing this as a small business mostly printing some De Vinci stuff on people seals. Simple as that 2 weeks after this conversation he landed in our garage again with his worker and they made this two awesome posters. Our place is not the same since that moment. Each time we enter the place we know exactly why we are going to spend all this hours there.  Every project has it's memorable moments. In our garage such a moment is the very first rivet installation. It is the last step to finalize all the preparation and the first one towards making real parts of the plane. As you may guess, we are going to count our rivets from here till that magic moment when the plane takes off from a nearby airfield. .
 I have seen that construction once or twice already but that time it was tied together with clecos and a true felling came that it is all temporary and will be dismantled in a moment - that exactly what happened. But that time it is a completely different feeling: it is done, it is there and one day we are going to fly on that part.  Less than 300 rivets ? and I am holding the first real part of the plane. What can be more exciting?! What a divine moment indeed. Nothing can stop us now! .
 The Rudder riveting is a bit more complex job. In most of it's parts it is very similar to the Vertical Stab, but some parts are new and are directly related to aerodynamics. Here we are breaking the leading edge just a little bit -- not to much but just enough to make it perfectly aligned after the leading edge bend.  Now the bending part: it looks a bit dangerous to make some round structures, but we did a good preparation and have actually done it once or twice on a training project. We also prepared the right tools: if that is the correct term for a piece of a plumbing pipe. Anyway, it worked perfectly including the blind riveting later. Great joy to see your first self-made leading edge of the real controller.  What is that? No, it is not a fuel leak sealing: it is an idea by Vans: how to cushion your crack-prone trailing edge. This time the wedge is riveted with what is called the wet riveting technique: code-name for squeezing up some goop between the skin and the wedge.  A bit more than a thousand rivets and we have our second part ready.  Guess what: once you have two parts that are sitting together on the plane, you can try the integration just in time you have them done. That is exactly what we had after the ruder was done, done, done. (No screws yet, waiting for the total Empennage assembly) .
Hard to believe that we got those boxes just about a month ago. This is still the first shy steps into the world of RVators. But 2 parts of a real plane is already something we can be proud of, and we are! We will continue to unbox the aviation for ourself and all the great guys that love to build stuff.  Cheers. Roman & Dima |
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Status Report: #8  That report is about:
That time the report is short and very focused on the Horizontal Stab. riveting. .
  After short session of painting we got the parts yellow shinny and corrosion protected. All is ready to make the final assembly. Front spar riveted together with the front spar cap, nose ribs, in-spar ribs tied together with the stringers. All that riveted together to form the backbone assembly of the two small wings of the Horizontal.   Two pieces of the skins to cover each wing all riveted to the flanges. and rear spar to seal the construction. .
That is it short but focused. The final riveting of the Horizontal finalizing the 3rd part of the plane. After exactly 1948 rivets we feel super energetic to move forward toward the 2 last parts of the Empennage.   Cheers. Roman & Dima |
awesome
you guys are making great progress and doing good work. I appreciate you taking the time to post your progress.
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Love it!
Really fun pictures. You guys look like you're having a blast. Thanks for posting.
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Thanks guys, we really having a lot of fun constructing the RV. The old say about enjoying the way is about us. 😉 |
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Status Report: #9  The complexity goes up and the reward is going to be adequate this time. The small wings that control the pitch are on the workbench: .
  First assembly: we create the ribs out of two separate parts of aluminum which will be connected later with blind rivets. This time the two small wings are not symmetric, cause we have: the trimmer. That is right the trimmer the first mechanical part that will move with help of small servo motor that will be also installed right there inside the elevator. We didn't hold the temptation and tried the fairing, also to check that wedge fabrication is correct - you have to polish it's corner a little bit to keep the aerodynamic shape. Da***mn it looks beautiful.   Skipping the coating session describing this time, you can believe us it was pretty similar to the other time we did it. The motor location is pretty cool and designed that way that you can take it out for inspection after the airplane will be already flying. Seven nut-plates are pre-dimpled to ensure smoothness of the external elevator skin. I think we will show you how it works on the main assembly stage. Two spars are holding the construction of each elevator together the front spar is also connected with the tip rib that also contains a heavy counter balance lead weight.  Unbelievable, I still remember our first one, and wasn't that too much time ago. Somewhere close to finishing the elevators we passed the 3000 rivets. Wow that is already some experience. Some rummors says we have 10,000 more to go.   Bending the leading edge is not different than all the other parts. The plumber pipe will do the magic, and several pop rivets will hold your construction smooth, round and aerodynamic. The trailing edge should be very sharp here. That is why the design works it out with the foam ribs that are small light and glued together with a simple tank pro-seal. .
The elevators are done, we spent almost 2 weeks working on that part - from the moment of open the draws and till the magic moment it had the connecting bearing on it. And we will show here that beauty in the next report once it will be installed on the full assembly of the Empennage.  Cheers. Roman & Dima |
Roman & Dima:
Thank you for the excellent build blog. I'm enjoying watching your progress. Also, your shop is very well organized! It looks great. Have fun building! |
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and cold beer in our workshop, we are only 12k km away from Arizona. 🍻 |
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Status Report: #10  That report is about:
After we have made small wing type structures (...four of them), now we have a chance to try our skills on the actual body of the plane. Here is how it looks like: .
 Like any usual work procedure, we drive as quickly as possible to the first assembly, drilling the matching holes, dimpling, deburring and — what is mostly important — studying the full idea behind the current assembly. This time, we have a very interesting structure constructed from ribs that look like large rectangular frames. The scale of the ribs is growing, that's how the conical structure have been achieved. All that tight together with large longerons and stringers to enforce the construction and finally is closed by large sheets of skin.  Once done, the first assembly looks shiny like a time machine from some science fiction book. Next steps: coat it with some yellow protection.  Usual procedure of coating is omitted here, but we couldn't help holding it and are publishing the first sight of all the internal ribs, nicely anti-corrosion protected.  Starting to rivet the whole thing. There is about 2000 rivets in this section alone.  After first 4000 rivets, you start feeling some confidence as for your chances to finish that job.  I have no idea how one can do that riveting job alone. We are lucky to have four hands. The work on the aft flows really smoothly and we're enjoying every single moment.  Finally, the first steps into the avionics world. The harness is for the ELT device, for the trimmer and the strobe light on the rudder. There will be more, but here touching this one for 5 minutes takes me back into high technology universe, and opens all the discussion about what other electronics we need: and very soon we will post more about that.  Back to the riveting trenches. The deck is, probably, the most interesting structure in this whole section. All the time doing it, I have been puzzled by the way the whole tail is assembled on that focal point. It wasn't that difficult — eventually, — but it required some concentration to get there. .
It took us 130 man hours and 2 calendar weeks to finish the Aft part. It is hard to believe but about two months after we touched the metal and really started this project. After almost 5000 rivets we are ready to assembly all the parts together and have full functioning Empennage. Expect for that in the next reports.  Cheers. Roman & Dima |
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