Tailcone rigitity

Could be that I'm just trying to find stuff to do before my QB kits get here but I have a small concern on if I should rivet on the aft tailcone top skin now before taking the rudder, VS & HS off.

My plan was to wait till the very end post engine/avionics install and not inhibit my ability of getting back there, is that completely fine? Seems most builders rivet this on, and I would hate to torque something only to mount my bits and pieces later and have the plane torqued sideways... thoughts?

IF you are referring to the top skin that attaches to the rear of the cabin cover, don't rivet it now. You will regret it later if you do. You'll want to rivet at the last possible moment before glassing in the cabin cover.

Otherwise you be climbing in through the baggage door to complete wiring and other tasks. With the top off, it's much easier on your back. Especially if you have adahrs or magnetometers to install back there.

Your aft or my aft?

If by "aft" top skin you mean the one aft of the one Bob mentioned... some do and some don't. I don't think it would affect the rigidity much for storage purposes. Certainly the forward-most top skin on the tailcone needs to stay off until after you attach the cabin cover. I forget what they refer to each one as in the plans.

We riveted our "aft" skin on in sequence with the plans (where it sounds like you are now) and don't regret it-- however installing things like the seat belt attach cables and the magnetometer mount were a bit of a PITA. I had an especially bad experience though because I swapped out with stainless bolts at a later time and had some galling problems, so instead of doing it once I had to do it the equivalent of like 3-4 times, with the middle experiences being particularly frustrating. That's all behind us now though

On the other hand, if you leave it un-riveted, you'll need to slither in there at some future time and rivet it on, which in my opinion would be almost as difficult as (if not harder than) the other tasks you made easier on yourself by leaving it off. So I guess it's a 50-50 in my opinion.

Small tangent, still tailcone parts but much later in the build: One thing I would definitely leave off if we did this again is that darn baggage bulkhead channel. When you get to section 33-8 Step 4, riveting the F-1028 baggage bulkhead channel to the F-1029R bellcrank rib, I'd recommend just leaving it cleco'ed. It's just 4 rivets and you can do them at a much later point (like right when you go to attach the cabin top). If you're even slightly horizontally challenged like me, you'll benefit from the increased slither room when doing things in the tailcone.

Good luck! -Mike

mikeyj350 said:

If by "aft" top skin you mean the one aft of the one Bob mentioned... some do and some don't. I don't think it would affect the rigidity much for storage purposes.

Click to expand...

Yes that's the one, it does cover in seatbelt brackets because I torqued those in last night. If there's no issue I'll just leave it cleco'd on and probably put the forward one that Bob mentioned up on a shelf for later.