RV-9A Andy C. Kalamazoo, Mi

[KazooRV-9A]

Rob I wish I could tell you what had gone so wrong with the wings and empennage that the original builder had worked. Many many rivets were over-bucked or essentially hammered into the skins. Numerous rivets were smiled or bent over. Holes were drilled oversize and ragged. The fuel tanks were unusable and other assemblies were unairworthy.
I knew nothing of the original project owner, save that he was older and had been in the local EAA chapter. He passed away which is how I came to obtain the project.
Maybe he lost focus on things, or was in such failing health that he couldn't manage the tools. Maybe he had no help.....
We'll take it from here and make him proud, hope he's watching!
A.

[JwWright57]

Great job on the 120 it looks amazing.

And looking at the second set of skins its amazing how much better the workmanship was......

[KazooRV-9A]

Last night we masked the fuselage to do some interior painting.
The booth is just one bay of my shop, that has Visqueen that I roll down and an exhaust fan.
Even though it's cold out up here in southwest Mi, we can shoot paint for this portion of the project. I run a 150,000 btu kerosene heater while we're spraying, and things come out just fine. Good friend, painter Greg H. will do the spray work here, he is a pilot, owns a body shop, and paints every day. You can't beat a man at his trade! (I paint things that don't matter....)

[Ces 140]

Hey hold off on the engine O/H until you completely mock up the cowl and all the engine accessories including exhaust. that will save a lot of dust and scratches on that new engine. Just my thought. Keep in touch Jeff

[KazooRV-9A]

Completed a good portion of the interior painting this past weekend. Parts were primed, sealed and color coated, came out great. Had to use low temp reducer, but painter Greg does this every day.
Now we can continue more of the fuselage assy!

This was the primer stage



In the paint booth, you can see the exhaust fan in the background



Heater/Poor man's make-up air system! It was about 35 Deg F outside Saturday.



Completed initial paintwork, ready for continued assy.

[KazooRV-9A]

This past weekend we started into an exciting phase for the build, the overhaul of the O-320-D3G engine! The core engine had come along with the entire project purchase, and I've been patiently waiting to do the teardown to see what we have.

It was a rare January thaw up here in SW Michigan, the thermometer topped 60 degrees last Saturday and we even opened the shop doors for a bit to let some of the sunshine and outside environment in. You can get cabin fever up here this time of year and this was a day to ward that off. RV building it turns out, is a great cure for cabin fever.

With the help of our local EAA Chapter 221 Tech Advisor, we tackled the complete disassy of the engine. Things look pretty good overall, no visually severe corrosion or damage, however as always, the NDT and other checks at the repair stations will tell the final tale on what we have.

For now it looks optimistic that we have a good core, I'm doubling my knowledge of this Lycoming powerplant and how to orchestrate its overhaul, every day. Lots of good advice coming in.

Just have to be brave when the repair invoices show up! I'm fastening my seatbelt...

Andy C.

Here's our starting point


Pistons and Cyls removed


The case


Parts to be organized


And the work area. It took another few hours to organize the parts and bag things up. Soon we'll be sending parts off for component level overhauls!

[Boyd Birchler]

Looks like a great engine. The pistons look really good, no evidence of harsh blow by on the piston skirts. The inside of the rear case,crank case and the rocker box areas of the cylinders indicate the engine is either very low time or has had frequent oil changes.

[KazooRV-9A]

Some evenings are a riot on this project, more head scratching than a Laurel and Hardy movie.
I bought another set of wings to replace the un-airworthy ones that came with the project, and one of those wings was nearly complete and the other in the crate. So we've been working on the one we have to fully build and it was pretty funny trying to figure out where the ribs go on the right wing. The left wing is easy, looks like the drawing, but you have to figure out that the right wing is mirrored. We couldn't exactly find that tidbit in the written instructions. it's probably there somewhere.
Three reasonably intelligent men trying to figure out where these aluminum puzzle pieces go. You experienced builders would have been laughing at us! (as was the wife, all parts look alike to her she says)
I'm pretty sure you could build these planes in a fraction of the time, but for the time spent wondering what the heck..
Onward through the storm....!

[C-FAH Q]

Hi Andy,
Once you put the top skin on, you'll know if the rib flanges are set the right direction.

[KazooRV-9A]

Some more work this past weekend. Riveted the ribs to the spars on the right wing, and put the top skins on for match drilling. Lots of holes I'm starting to realize! I find I will need more silver Cleco's....

Wife made some RV builder brownie's for the group of us, which powered us through the day. (there's a few of the local EAA Chapter members that I suspect like to escape Saturday honey-do's, to work on an RV)

Right wing in the holding jig:



Top Skins in place for drilling:



Then also more work on the top turtledeck. Finished match drilling at some new J-Stringers I had to re-make. Now just need to debur and dimple and the top skins can ne riveted later on. Wife says it looks like a porcupine. Turtles, porcupines, what other animals are in this plane she asks.





Here's the setup we made for dimpling, works OK.



Here's the crank from the 0320-D3G that we're preliminarily inspecting before sending out for full checks. People seem to have all kinds of trepidations about these hollow cranks, we're hoping that it's still serviceable. Advice to me has been, "If you don't have a crank, you don't have an engine". We'll see what happens.