Looks like nice work. I've enjoyed looking at all the pics!!

Thanks
 

Thanks Andy.

Looks like you're making good progress, and adapting well to figuring things out. Your pictures and commentary remind me of many of the mini-milestones I saw while on my RV7 building journey. It just gets better and and fun as the pieces get bigger and more interesting. Soon you won't have to imagine how it's going to look. You're gonna love building and flying that plane.

Bevan

Thanks for the kind words. Yes I am still having a blast with this... But looks like It will be a very slow build... good thing I am not counting hours.

#28
 

Today I had another very good riveting session. Spend about 4 hours in the shop. Called it a night at midnight. I picked up things where i left off. So the right side of the HS was on the schedule.

Again I started by riveting the nose rib to the skin like I did on the left side. Much quicker this time around. Looks good to me.


I feel like I always manage to screw up one rivet so that I alway have to drill one out. This is pretty much a non event as long as things are accessible at this point.

Drilled this one with a smaller metric size drill bit...


Then give it a few turns with the actual size drill bit of the whole and pop of the head. usually they come right off.


This is from the inside. This is how I like them to come out. Dead center on the punch!


By the way. This is how I make sure I do everything. I mark everything I have completely done with the a highlighter on the plans. In theory only things that I didn't do would be not marked and easy to spot.


I first put the front spar back in and riveted the line of rivets of the going up, then I riveted left and right alternating one by one.


Here are the rivets all done from the outside


On the outside ribs HS-706 I used this self made bucking bar for the last 2 rivets where things get real tight. This worked out "ok" I do not own a no whole yoke for the Tatco. They are like 75$ and by the time they get to me they are around 150$. For now I am going to try to get away without it.


This is pretty much what I get for being a little cheap... A little dent on the outside


For now I will consider the HS done because I still need to get somebody to check out my work before I close her up but there are only a few rivets left. Everything accessible from the outside


***PS*** (Day after) I feel like I had one heck of a work out. May have to cancel gym membership...

You will not see that little dent and it may have been caused by the end of the rib, not the bucking bar.
Excellent technique on rivet removal.
Your work looks good.

Thanks. Yea I figure if I do paint up there the fiberglass and filler will cover that all up. Still It bugged me quite a bit. Getting over it now ;) But good point. I didn't think about the possibility that that might have just been caused by the rib itself. Poor prep then...

Really gives me confidence that you say that it looks good. Nobody but me has actually seen my work in person thus far.

#29
 

Today I cleaned up the shop a bit from the HS work and started fresh with a clean table.



Yap. Back riveting the stiffeners of the rudder skins.


A bit of tape helps to prevent marks on my parts


One skin done, one to go!


The counterbalance rib R-912 riveted to the R-902 spar. Honestly I couldn't find the rivet call out on the plans... but I just used what I felt was the correct length. I think a 4-5


Counterbalance skin R-913 riveted to the R-912 but not to the spar


The counterbalance led didn't clear the rivets so I needed take some led off


Here we go. Hope Vans took this into account...


Mistake of the day...I let the rivet set walk of the edge... New dent!


This is it for today...

Counterbalance
 

Too late but next time (elevators), just use a flat punch or a 3/8" extension and hammer to pound the relief area into the lead. It re-shapes pretty easy and no weight is lost.

Shoot! That's a good call Larry. Didn't even think about it. Thank you for pointing it out.

#30
 

I had a short session. Spend about 2.5h in the shop. Finishing the other side of the Rudder R-913 to the Rudder skin. I had stopped the other day after one proud rivet. I figured best to come back to this because it was getting late.

So first thing was to drill that rivet.


YaY!


These were a bit of a pain to set because the access with the bucking bar is limited. Also the whole Rudder is a bit of a pain because I didn't bother building a jig for it and had no good way to hold everything down while riveting. Mostly my fault.


Thanks to Larry I was able to make the counterbalance led fit perfectly. Good call on that again. I used my key as anything round really will work since the led is really soft.


Here is finished product


I am wondering about this rib. Anyone know if I could enlarge these 2 wholes and that way there would be access to the nuts of the counterbalance to check later? assuming the fiberglass tip is secured by screws this way these would accessible. Anyone?


Man this blows I keep seeing that dent I put in there the other day....

Congratulations
 

Congratulations. Purdy!

#31
 

Another short 2.5 h in the shop.

I have other things keeping me away from the shop so It had been a few days.

I started torquing down the counterbalance weight. I had already done this but I checked again with the torque wrench just to make sure. This is one of the areas I won't be able to get back to check.

I also opened the Sikaflex and put some on around the bolt. Not sure this will help but I have seen other people do this. I don't think it makes much of a difference.


Installing the rivets of the tip rib. I had to watch out since there are 2 different rivet length used here.


All done. I used the rivet gun on all of these.


I have over and over thought how to best do the trailing edge of the rudder. turns out non of my work tables are 100% straight. So I used a new straight piece of wood and screwed the aluminum angle to it so that they are flush.


A dab of Sika between the stiffeners will hopefully prevent cracking of the skin. Or so I am told.


All clecoed to the angle. the shop is a mess again. Sorry about that.
I will just have to leave to dry for a week or so.


By the way: the tight wholes in the end of the ribs I could't reach with my regular bucking bar but I just taped a thin steel bar to my bucking bar. This works pretty good.


Different View: I use lots of protective tape on my bars...

#32
 

Alright. It's time to just do it!

First off: I decided to use Sikaflex instead of pro-seal for mainly cost reasons.
Sikaflex is a freaking mess to spread evenly. The stuff sticks to just about everything and is pretty nasty. I thought I did a good job spreading on to the wedge. I decided this based on old threads on the forum...

My process: I deviated from the plans slightly. I drilled the TE to the aluminum angle that I had screwed flush to the table. Made sure everything is straight about 10 times and then glued it all with Sikaflex. So far so good...

I waited a few days. Came back. Then I flipped the angle to the side that had NO wholes in it. Also screwed flush to the table.

Now I put a rivet in every whole and taped them on so that they wouldn't fall out. The side with the shop head now layed flush onto the angle side that had no wholes. Since my angle is pretty thick I saw no harm in just using the hand squeezer to set the rivets half way with the angle in place. So in essense I used the angle as a back riveting plate with the hand squeezer. Makes sense? This also worked out very well.

Not sure if I explained it wery well. I didn't take any pictures at the time so this is after the fact and with my practice mini wing on the angle. Just to show how I did this step...


After checking again for straightness. Looked good to me.... It was time to get out the rivet gun with the flush set. I worked very slowly and did every 10th whole and worked alternating until all of them were set.

While I was setting the first few rivets I was saying all kinds of bad words because I noticed that while I was riveting I was getting some waviness between the rivets. This is due to the Sikeflex only being compressed where the rivet set hits the surface. Yet, I was pretty sure I wasn't going to accomplish much by drilling them out, I pressed on. After setting all of them and cleaning up everything with a sotch brite pad I was actually a little happier than before.

The rudder itself is straight! on the side that was back riveted laying on the riveting plate (the shop head) it looks great and is straight and perfect! On the other side (manufacturing head) there are little waves between the rivets due to the ever so slight amount of Sika that was not compressed compared to the parts around the rivets that were hit with the flush head.

View from the back


Zooming in you will see what I mean.


It does lay flat on the table. So that's good




Personal take away:
Well, all in all riveting these rivets really wasn't that hard and I think using a hand squeezer to partially set rivets while the edge is still in place on the angle is the way to go! If I were to do it again tomorrow I would not use Sika or pro-seal again. I am sure this is due to my poor application. I think the double sided tape would have been easier. However I decided to do the Sika route because of people saying that the result looks better using pro-seal. Ok, Maybe this is true but it certainly not on my first try. I would be inclined to say. I would actually rather try without anything at all. I think that would make the best look in the end without anything between the wedge and the skin. I am pretty sure I could have gotten the same straightness without using any kind of glue... So yea these are my 2 cents

The Rudder is done except for the 1 most aft rivet on top and the bottom ribs on each side, the 8 rivets that attach the rudder horn brace to the skin and rolling the leading edge... I have nothing that will reach these rivets at this time. I think 2 types of Yokes are needed for these. No whole and a longeron yoke. I will not buy these now so I will tape these wholes and leave it till later or maybe somebody can borrow these tools to me.

Done for today. Rudder is now on wheels! I am already starting to make airplane noises ;)


- Honestly I am not that thrilled with the result. Not sure how good or bad this thing turned out.

#33
 

Have been busy with school work and exams, so no real progress but I gave polishing a go because the longer my parts are sitting the in the shop the more I like the idea of polished aluminum. I did scratch the parts quite a bit with the SB while I was deburring. I wasn't sure if it would come out but it does after quite a bit of elbow grease.

Before:


After:

Thanks for the posts
 

Thanks for the posts... fun!

#34
 

Alright so after a bit of a break from actual building I cleaned the shop a bit and started doing some elevator work. I have been putting off the bending so I started just drilling everything.

I started making a new template for my stiffeners out of steel angle. When it comes to the left elevator stiffners some need to be cut shorter. The plans tell you the following:


This gave me a few hours of WTF? because I thought I had it right marked them and then looked at them and something felt off. Luckily I didn't actually cut anything because I would have made scrap metal! So I must have measured this about 10 times before I felt sort of comfortable cutting anything...

Next was to drill the stiffners to the skin. I stated with the right elevator.


I initially didn't care much for removing the vinyl with the soldering iron because I thought I was going to paint anyhow. Now that I tried polishing and I like the look I will try to keep the parts scratch free from now on. I taped the rivet wholes with painters tape and used that as a guide for the iron. works well but is a bit of a waste of tape.


After all stiffners had been drilled I started working on the right elevator.

Here I drilled the counterbalance weight


Countersunk the led with lots of lube


Dimpled the skin


All drilled!


Disassemble, then countersink some things. Like under the attach horn. My cage was to large to fit the outer rivets so I took the cage apart and used it by hand.


Can't tell the difference...

#35
 

I have been a bit afraid of bending the trim tab. Weather or not to use riblets.

Well after my rudder trailing edge experience I decided to go with my gut and not necessarily follow the plans 100% on these steps.

I used a few of the extra sheet metal to redraw and cut them into the same shape as the trim tab to practice on. I did 5 practice runs before I used the real thing. Honestly. I should have used 6. the last 2 are darn well perfect.

Mark the bend lines with a sharpie.


Some double sided tape to prevent anything from moving. Note that I had to take the vinyl off to make this work.


Stuck it to a straight piece of MDF wood. Very strong but thin.


Some more double sided tape on top


Another piece of MDF on top and secure everything with clamps


Start bending with another piece of MDF. I didn't use the rivet gun for any of the bends. Just my hands and wood. Just went real slow and easy. Out of all the bends I did on actual AC parts this first one was the worst. The rest were much better.


---

Next


Next


Next


Done!

Very nice! :)

Thank you!

#36
 

It has been a while since I posted any progress. Not to say I haven't been making any but I will say I have been moving much slower than I thought.
I also made a few mistakes on the elevators and trim tab.

Full disclosure: from the previous post you can see I did a pretty good job bending the tabs over. Well, That is because I deviated from the plans and changed the order. The plans tell you to do that last. At the time I didn't see it but it bit me in the butt later. Bending the tabs before bending the Trailing edge is easier but it kind of causes trouble because to ensure a good TE you have to over bend it a little because of the spring back of the metal. That is asking for trouble because the nicely bend tabs are in the way.



So I managed but I caused a tiny crack in the Trim tabs small top end. VANS said it is OK and to just stop drill it but I kid of hate it.



I have decided to go ahed and finish the trim tab anyway. Next thing is that I back riveted the rivets on the Trim tab. But I didn't do the E717&E718 first. Having no Longeron Yoke those rivets really sucked! They aren't perfect. If It bothers me enough I will just order a whole new trim tab whenever I buy the wings.



But Lets get back in order of things. I match drilled both sides of the elevator and trim tab at the same time. Dimpled all of it and deburred everything.
Next silly thing on my happy train of mistakes. I some how messed up a dimple on the left elevator. Don't know how but it really sucked.

This is my setup. Has worked great for all the other pieces. I guess I wasn't paying attention.


Here it is in all of it's glory!





OK So another email to Vans after saying a bunch of bad words. They said an UPs rivet may work fine here. I had purchased these in the beginning thinking I needed them. As it turned out I had not used a single one up to this point so I wend ahed and tried to recreate my genius dimple on a scrap piece to find out how to work the ups rivets. From the outside this cannot be seen. except for the rivet being a difference color. Good safe I guess.

After all the deburring work it was time for what looks to be the last priming session of the empenage kit. I have been taking a tremendous amount of time for the priming prep. So I decided to split it in 2 sessions. I am glad I did. It is a bit of a waste of materials but it also doesn't take 8 hours straight. So it was a bit more pleasant to me.



Since I may want to polish I decided to tape off the parts that are exposed to the outside. This is the Counterbalance skin where it overlaps with the main elevator skin.



Next thing was to backrivet the stiffeners to the skins. I layed them out in order while priming them to not run the risk of mixing them up. Worked out good. The corner rivets close to the bend where the hardest to get.

#37
 

The bending of the Trailing edge. I had been putting this off because I read so much grief about it on the Forums. Eventually I just started doing it. As I said before I created my own additional problem here by bending over the tabs before this step. DON'T DO THAT!

I used 2 pieces of oak with 6 hinges. I think a continuous piano hinge would be best but I didn't have one of those. I used a 4mm wooden wedge taped into position with double sided tape. That worked well. But was a pain to get out later. I also taped the skin with double sided tape on the bottom side of the bend. That was to ensure nothing moves while I apply pressure. That worked out good as well. My bend is close but not prefect. I choose to not over do it because I didn't want to crack any more things. I may have to manually adjust the bend later in the areas where it does need improvements. But as I said it is pretty darn close. I went very slow on this. Took for ever!





Next on the list of things to do was to build both skeletons. I started with the rear spar E702L/R.



Using lots of tape to prevent scratches.



After the skeleton is done the plans tell you to rivet 2 rivets on each side of the overlap of the E-701 and the E-713 counterbalance skin together to prevent the need for pop rivets at that locations. Makes sense.



Then it is time to insert the skeleton to the skin. I put a clecoe in every whole starting at the counter balance weight to make sure all is straight. EHHHH. Another mistake. I forgot the dab of RTV at the stiffeners. Ok no big deal un clecoe and reclecoe. My RTV pistol was at my buddies so I used a different one that. That one sucked. I really made a mess with this stuff. The problem was every time I squeeze the pistol there was way to much remaining pressure in it so it just kept poring all over the place and sticking to everything and ensuring that only a very small amount was put at the right location was a challenge. I had to finish one side because otherwise the RTV in place already would dry in the wrong position. I did get my gun for the other side and that worked out great as I was used to. No mess no fuzz.



Ok, now time to rivet :) I started at the top where the counter balance weight is located and did one rivet at the time alternating sides. This took way longer than it would have if I had done all rivets on one side first. I did this because I wanted to make sure I didn't create a twist in the elevator.



Again using lots of tape. Going slow. I had to drill out 1 on the right elevator.

On the left elevator it was pretty much the same except for the cut out for the trim tab.
With now most of the rivets set except for the ones around the trim tab thing aren't moving anymore. I had to do 2 more pop rivets on the bend. Next mistake. I believe I should have used a MSP-42 rivet here. Those are non flush rivets.



I did think about any way to prevent me from using the pop rivets in the middle connecting the E-701L to the E-606PP. I couldn't think of any thing that would risk making more mistakes. Ironically I must have messed up at the inventory so when I was looking for the called out rivets MK391BS I had larger rivets in the box. So I was like OMG!!! another mistake! Did I not drill and dimple for #30 at this location?



So I quit that night and went home. Glad I did. As it turned out I just had somehow swapped labels for my pop rivets. So the ones that go in there need to be drilled to a #33 and will work fine with the #40 dimple. Well good enough because solid rivets as I learned are 100° and pop rivets are 120°. So if I had known I could have bought another set of special dimple dies for the pop rivets. Since it was to late to do anything about it anyway I went ahed and set them. They look fine.

#38
 

Trim Tab fun begins....

This thing didn't turn out as well as I had hoped. I clecoed everything. Together and decided it would be smart to backrivet the bottom row of rivets. That worked fine but I didn't think to try if my squeezer would get in there to set the rivets. This is one of those times a longeron Yoke would have solved the problem. I didn't have one and went ahed and improvised...Never a good idea. I got them in there but they aren't as good as I would have liked them to be and have a few scratches on them. That add to the fact that the corner top skin has a tiny crack due to my bending of the TE I may or may not choose to rebuild this thing. But I will decide that later.

Back riveted the bottom.



My trouble some rivets that gave me grief!



Somehow got them in there but they have a few scratches now...



Everything clecoed together.



Bottom side


Hinge attached

#39
 

So I am done with most of the riveting but I had left out a few hard to reach rivets on the rudder & elevators. I asked Vans about using pop rivets as the plans do say I can use the CS4-4. There is a problem with that.

By the way the CS4-4 are a vans name and are equal to the BSC-44.
Now, these rivets are acutally flush pull rivets that are to be drilled to a #30 and dimpled as well. Those corner tight wholes in the elevator and rudder I had drilled and dimpled to the #40. I see no way to get in there with a dimpler for a #30 and also I don't know if I could even dimple a skin and a rib at the same time. So I asked Vans if I could use the same rivets I have been using on elevators called MK319BS. These are to be drilled to a #33 and use the #40 dimple. They said that that would be acceptable as long as the grip is within range. But he also send me a link to an EAA video about indirect riveting. LINK EAA

I had already seen this video when I was riveting the practice kit but I did pretty poorly and decided to not do that again back then.

Now a few 100 or 1000 rivets later I decided to give it another shot. I did it a bit different tough.

I put the rivets in the wholes that I wanted to rivet and taped them.



Made sure the skin is very flush with the steel plate. I had to drill one out because It wasn't, thus causing a proud rivet. Also used some tape to prevent scraches.



Taped everything in place so there is as little movement as possible.



My version of indirect riveting involves another piece of steel about the hight of a rivet. This prevents the angle on the head being to steep and makes it easier to not mess up the rivet head.



I used very short but strong bursts. I used a lot more pressure than I would usually use to rivet a 3-3.5 rivet.



Final results are very acceptable I think.



The only whole I couldn't get are the most corner one on the Rudder. Even my little scrap steel part I used here is to thick. I wonder if it would be bend if I shaved it down to a size that would fit in that whole. I read on the -14 the plans tell you to use pull rivets here...



RV-14 Plans

That is what I did on my rudder, used the MK-319-BS on the last two. The RV-7 plans actually say in the rudder section that you can do this. Nice work by the way.

Thanks. The only problem is that my kit didn't come with enough of them. I ran out! I guess I will just leave them for now. Don't feel like ordering 10 of them for 12$ with stupid shipping...

Rivets are very soft. I bet you could get away with thinning out your steel bar. Nothing to lose if you test it on scrap first. +1 on Nice work.

Ya I am going to run out as well, too bad we don't live closer so we can do a group order and only spend $12 to ship 20 of them! lol :D

Haha. True. Shipping is really killing me on my end. I will just wait I think.

#40
 

I forgot to finish the last post of the left elevator trim tab attachment. For me this was a tricky one and also something I would want to do better on the next one. But again I send VANS some pictures and they said it's fine.

Let me explain. The difficulty happens when there are countersunk and dimpled parts mating on top of each other. If things are absolutely perfect things will go south... There is also some added difficulty as these rivets are very hard to reach, at least with tools that I have. I was told a longeron yoke would solve this problem. However I have now borrowed one (after the fact) and I wouldn't have been able to reach any of them with that yoke due to the opposite side being in the way.

First I used the aluminum angle I had used for the Rudder TE to align the elevator with the trim tab. The plans call for a minimum gap. Since I had already riveted the hinge of the Trim tab I actually didn't have a great deal of play.


checking alignment again. When looking closely my 2 bend lines aren't 100% parallel to one another. So that confused me at first. But I suppose it is just another imperfection my plane is going to have to fly with.


These were the rivets that gave me some trouble. The spar of the trim tab is countersunk. The skin is dimpled. My first mistake here was to start at the inside instead of at the bend. Essentially things didn't line up 100% and I created a bit of a waviness in the skin. That caused a bit of canning at the rivet lines. At the time I was ready to start a new elevator but Vans assured me that this is actually not going to be a problem besides being a cosmetic issue.


After Fighting like **** with this row of rivets. I had to get these 2 last rivets and that was also not as easy as it would have been if I had just riveted these beforehand while the skeleton was still flexible and not held in place by the skin. The plans call for this order but if I had to do it again I would rivet them in there before. I had to improvise here to get in there with the 3" Tatco Yoke.


Here is the finished product.

#41
 

Between post #40 and #41 I took a break from building. Next thing on the to do list was roll the leading edges of the rudder and elevators. I needed a edge breaking tool. I had ordered one of the nylon roller type and it just never made to me. Since every order I make of these "special" tools usually come from the USA and it takes a few weeks I had was kind of out of things to do.

Eventually I asked a follow builder if I could borrow a few things to finish the empenage kit. But with busy schedules that also took a few weeks. So this past Monday I finally started working on the plane again.

Here is what I borrowed. I swear I felt like a kid on Christmas when I could finally get building again. Little did I know what was about to unfold.


Full disclosure, I thought I would roll the LE in a day and pop some pull rivets and be done with it... WRONG!

This turned out to be the worst part of the whole kit thus far for me. I absolutely didn't get how to properly do this. Even after yet another builder send me an email with pictures on how he did it and spend some time on the phone with me explaining his method (THANK YOU SO MUCH) I still had a really hard time with it and spend the better part of 20 hours spread over 3 days rolling these 3 leading edges.

Let's try to start at the beginning.
This is what I started with. 2 pretty decent looking elevators. By the way I primed the outside of the control surfaces during my non building time because I was getting pretty bad filliform surface corrosion at the rivet heads. I talked to Vans about it and due to the climate here I decided the parts were going to need some protection for the time of the build.



I used 3M tape and a wooden broom handle. Size was something like 0.85in. The plans call for 3/4 -1" so I thought this would work well. First I tried to roll them all at once but that didn't work out so good so I did them in 3 sections.

Then I turned it around and started rolling. I had carved the end of the wood to better hold it with some pliers. I also had this self made tool holding the wood from rolling up and preventing the bend close to the spar.


Result wasn't very pleasing. I suppose you can hardly tell whats going on this picture. But Lets just say I had an incredible hard time with this task.


After the phone call from a local builder he suggested to use a 22mm galvanizes pipe. So desperate me went to the hardware store bought exactly that and tried again. The tape stuck better to the pipe than to the wood. Ok. But I was still getting nowhere. Also, I felt I needed different sizes in diameter for the different sections. the small most outer part was easily done at first try with the pipe. The others not so much.

So this was version 2.0


What I found in the archives is that a lot of people had good success with this method: Socket Roller

I actually didn't take any picture because I was just really pissed at the whole time... I did Video tape the process. So if I get bored enough I may throw together a little clip.

Here is one elevator.






Oh yea and 2 roles of tape...


This was a PITA! What bugs me most is that through the whole first kit there have been tricky things but all was due to the fact that I have never done it before and was unfortunately making experiences on the actual parts. But after there was always. "well next time I will get it perfect, because now I know how to do it" Weather it was just use this tool over that or try different technique. But the rolling leading edges had non of that. If I had to do all of them again tomorrow it wouldn't get easier nor would I get a better results. So that was the most frustrating part for me.

I didn't learn how to do it and that is usually the rewarding part of the process

#42
 

Now that I have complained enought about the leading edges I got to do some things that I did know how to do. Drilling and cutting...

I followed the plans and put the Rod end bearing into the elevators to the correct spacing and attached the elevator to the rear spar of the HS. I had a bit of a hard time at first because I had primed the powder coated brackets and the bolts didn't want to go in. Since the space it tight I decided to drill away the paint from the wholes. I guess this will be a corrosion issue place but since it will be lubed it should be no problem I suppose.

After that they slid right in. (BTW my rear spar of the HS isn't riveted in place because I still need to get it signed off)


Next thing I needed to trim the HS to match the elevators movement. I think the HS is the same as the RV-8 and therefore needs to be adjusted a bit.


Nothing hard. Still took my sweet time. Measure twice. Cut once.


I drilled the corner of the cut with a small drill and then used a dremel tool to cut the rest.



Deburr


Repeat 4 times... DONE!

#43
 

One little modification I have done to my tail feathers I had previously written about. I had used this flexible cable tubing in the front end of the VS going to the top because I am planning on having an antenna and / or a camera up there. The idea was stolen from others on the forum, but my design was flawed. I didn't notice this until I accidentally moved the VS abruptly and it had made a disturbing noise. The hose being flexible and the VS being tight caused contact with the skin.



Just to give you an idea what type of tube I had used.


Glad I caught this now rather than later. My new solution needed to be something that didn't move. So I bought a light weight pipe made of fiberglass. Cut to length and installed.


View from the inside

I feel your pain on them leading edges, they were not easy to do! I found that the front of them had to have a tighter radius than the section closest to the spar. Your rolled edges look great though!

Thanks. Don't let the pictures fool you. But I just saw yours. They look perfect!

#44
 

#44 Placeholder for things.

#45
 

#45 Placeholder for things.

#46
 

#46 Placeholder for things.

#47
 

While I have never flown or sat any RV7, a friend sometimes takes me flying in his RV-9A. This always motivates me but a few weeks ago he let me get some stick time from the right for about 30 min. The -9 feels so nicely compared to the spam cans that I am used to.

I hope the -7 will be even better!

#48
 

Remember when I said “I will be back” ?

Well I am and come bearing news: I have received my RV-7 Wing kit and it all worked out in the end but it was a very long journey with quite a few bumps along the way.

The following is my PIREP about buying a used RV kit. This may or may not be of interest to you. So feel free to skip it.

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I had talked to multiple people that were selling wing kits over the past 8 months. Two deals fell through very early. Either because the seller didn’t want to deal with me shipping the kit outside the continental US or simply because of the stage of build that the wings are in. Once the ribs are attached to the wings the size of shipping crates would have to be huge. The kit price would have had to be very low to offset the crating and shipping charges of a halfway assemble wing kit.

I decided I was looking for a “barely” started standard build (SB) kit that could still go back into a crate of reasonable size.

What I found back in beginning of February was a used kit that was advertised as “unstated in original crates”. I was not able to inspect the parts because they were located in the USA and I am not. Flying over and looking at them would have made any savings insignificant.

I thought to myself “well that’s perfect, they can just pick it up and it will be easy…”

NOPE! Far from it. I must have send about an email a day for about 3-4 weeks until everything was finalized. I received a scanned copy of the original shipping list. With that I called Vans and talked to them about it and about risks and concerns. They have a pretty good guide on buying used parts. I must admit they were more against buying used than for it. They probably have their reasons based on past experience.

Well stubborn me at that point really wanted those wings. I went out and got a bunch of quotes for shipping since I had the dimensions and weight of the crates off the Vans website that was easy. However, the long 186“ crate ruled out a lot of shippers. Fedex wouldn’t not touch it. I received a very good quote from UPS, or so I thought.

I had made my final offer and agreements / contract based on that quote.

Even though I had the quote in writing the way their conditions (*) are written they can pretty much charge whatever they feel like after pickup. What happened was that I called them to get the quote. Without my awareness due to the oversize of the crate I was forwarded to UPS business end. I did buy these wings as a private person from a private person. So no business involved. I was then told that if that was the case the quote was no good and they would not give me another one or ship these at all.

So after I send a bunch of money to the seller in good faith I had no shipping arrangements and I had to start all over.

For some reason until then I had never been asked about the wood and crates, however little did I know how important that information was. I was then told that if the crates are not “ISPM 15” stamped they would not be able to leave the USA on any kind of vessel. This is a bug regulation to prevent bugs ruining forests in other countries.

Oh boy! I bought a set of wings in crates with no such stamp.

I called vans and asked them if they could verify that their crates were made to ISPM 15 standards. They send me a copy of their membership with the organization that gives out that stamp and they told me they have been making crates to this standard since 2006. My wings are not that old but they never bothered to stamp the crates because they weren’t meant for international shipping.

SERIOUSLY?

Yes, I have crates that are perfectly good and I have to trash them because they weren’t stamped...Go figure.

This is what the stamp should look like by the way.


The next days I spend getting yet another set of quotes that included repacking the crates and shipping. Cost a bunch of money more but at least someone was willing to do it.

Next issue I had not foreseen: All of the quotes based from the US to the nearest sea port. I thought I could just pick it up there, deal with customs myself and take the kit home with me. Well after further investigating I was told I can’t just do that. I need a local shipping company at the port to deal with unloading the crates from the ship and putting the in storage, then they will deal with customs on my behalf and then I can come pick it up.

I asked the US shipping company to give me a contact information of their partners at the port of destination. They gave me a name and I called them up and asked them for a quote of fees for their services. Yea, that was another hard blow. They wanted about 580$ for the handling things at the port!

In the meantime, I was figuring out that while I can drive a trailer I cannot legally pull one long enough for the long crate.

Another call to the guys at the port: they will happily deliver the crates to my house for another 615$.

At this point I was pretty much crying inside since the ocean freight is less than the handling fees and a home delivery of 200 miles of trucking.

OMG! What a nightmare...