P

prkaye

Well Known Member
I was trying to drill some holes in my garage floor, so I could screw some brackets down (I'll need to do this for my wing stands eventually).
I got a carbide drill bit and put it in my high-torque drill (big electrical drill).
I could barely make a dent in the floor, even applying considerable downward force.
Any suggestions?
 
Use concrete drill bits and a slow speed drill. Using regular drill bits on concrete will just dull your drill bits.

I just mounted my wing stands using 1/2" concrete anchors and found it best to drill a 1/4" pilot hole before drilling the big ones.

Good luck!

--Ken
 
Hammer Drill

Buy, borrow, or rent a hammer drill. It uses concrete bits but hammers and drills slowly at the same time. I have a "Bosch Bulldog" that is fantastic but pricey. Harbor Freight has very inexpensive ones. If you are like me, you'll end up using it more than you think.

George
 
What Ken said...

A carbide bit isn't the one to use. Use a masonry bit (inexpensive). Masonry bits are the 'funny looking' bits with a large 'tooth' on the tip. When drilling concrete, especially older concrete, like Ken said- it's best to drill a smaller pilot hole first (smaller masonry bit) then the actual hole size. Remember that concrete continues to harden for over 20-years until reaching its hardest form. Use lag shields (made out of lead) to hammer down into the holes. BTW, the lag shields will tell you on the side what size lag bolt to use and what size hole to drill in order for the shield to fit tightly/properly in the final hole.

And remember, slower drill speeds work better for drilling into concrete, and be sure to drill deep enough for not only the lag shield to be completely flush with the surface, but to also facilitate the overall length of the lag bolt when it is inserted through the stand (etc) and into the shield. In other words, you don't want your lag bolt bottoming out into concrete before it has a chance to be fully inserted. Lag bolts, lag shields, masonry bits...cheap, cheap, cheap. Probably < $20 for everything.

Let us know how it works out.
 
Thanks! :)

Awesome, thanks guys. I saw "carbide drill bit" and read that it would drill through steel, and naively figured steel was harder than concrete...

Sort of related question - Rudy has those sweet metal wing stands that don't need to be anchored in the ceiling. Where can you buy long rectangular steel posts like he used?
 
Your local steel yard. I built mine for $12.00 ($1/ft). 9 Feet of 1x3 steel tube and 3 feet of angle. A lot of builders use 2x4 but the 1x3 is plenty strong.
 
I glued 2 x 6 wood blocks to the floor with construction adhesive, then screwed my brackets into those. Once done with the jigs, I used a pry bar to remove the wood blocks. The result- no holes left behind. The construction adhesive is very strong and smells good while curing :)
Hmmm...perhaps I could use a good huff right now!
 
>> 9 Feet of 1x3 steel tube and 3 feet of angle

Is that for one wing post, or a pair?

>> I glued 2 x 6 wood blocks to the floor...

No holes, but how did you manage to get the adhesive off the floor?
 
Last edited:
Concrete

If you are drilling into concrete to secure the Van's "wing jig" the drilling might not be necessary. An instructor at a EAA Workshop gave us two methods to achieve similar results. 1. Place the 4x4 in a small puddle of Bondo, get it straight and let it cure. It will hold extremely well. To remove it slam the 4x4 hard from the side with a hammer and it will pop off the concrete leaving little to clean up. 2. Get some of this rubber waffle like stuff you would use to keep things from slipping on your bench top. Place that under the 4x4 and it will not slip away.
I used #1 and it worked great. The 4x4s lasted through to whole wing building process and are now ready for removal.
Good luck.
Bob
 
I used Liquid Nails construction adhesive, http://www.liquidnails.com/home.do when done the 4x4 posts peeled off and any adhesive left on the floor came off easily using a flat blade shovel. Posts were bolted to rafters in the garage and the liquid nails stabilized the bottoms, keeping them from moving around.
 
I concur with adhesive. I first tried drilling a hole for an anchor in my floor and the anchor ended up not holding real well. I then just bought some 90-degree steel clips from Home Depot (found in the framing section) and used liquid nails to glue them to the floor. Then set the posts up to them and screw the clips to the posts. Worked great. The reason I used the clips rather than just glueing the wood to the floor is that I could adjust the base perfectly by using washers as shims between the clip and the post.

When I was done I unscrewed the post from the clip, hit the clip with a hammer. Clip popped off the floor and I scraped the rest of the liquid nails off the floor with a putty knife in about 3 minutes. Except for the one hole I tried to drill, my garage floor looks like new. Would do it again as well.
 
Last edited:
Don't drill ANY holes or use adhesive...

When I built my wing jig, I put down some 2x4's on the floor and wedged my custom-built 4x4's between the boards on the floor and some that I put up on the ceiling secured to the roof trusses above the dry wall ceiling. You can see photos of the installation at this web site link:

http://www.n2prise.org/rv9a003.htm

Look carefully in the photos and you will see where I used a large RED Sharpie marking pen to outline the bottom boards on the garage floor to be sure to alert me if the boards ever shifted - - they stayed put through the whole wing construction phase of the project. I updated that page on October 26, 2004 in response to another builder who asked a similar question about wing jig construction and available space in my one-car garage to build an airplane inside. The following pages of my web site show the wing jig in action with my wings on it during the various phases of wing construction.

Since I rent my townhouse, I did not want to drill any holes in the concrete floor, but I did get the owner's approval before drilling any holes in the ceiling and the truss above. When I told him it could take three years to build the airplane, he realized that I would be a long-term resident. That was four years ago. The airplane was ready to move to the airport after 2 years and 5 months of construction.

I helped a friend with his quick build wings, which still required a wing jig to finish installing the lower skins correctly. We used the same technique to build a wing jig at his shop. We used my old hardware to assemble the wing jig and secure it to his roof trusses above the dry wall ceiling. You can see some of that jig with a wing on it on this web page: http://www.n2prise.org/wfrv8020.htm

Jerry K. Thorne
East Ridge, TN
RV-9A N2PZ
189.6 Hobbs Hours since June 2005.
 
no access to rafters

The problem in my case is that I can't secure the things in the ceiling because the garage door has to open over top of them.

If the adhesive pops off with a single hammer blow, wouldn't you be concerned your whole jig could pop off the floor if the post got a sufficient jolt??
 
I used a hammer drill. That was the only way I could reasonably drill a hole in the garage floor for my wing stands. It still wasn't easy.
 
Yup, hammer drill here as well. Long day of drilling holes in 29 year old concrete.

1-7-06-003w.jpg
 
prkaye said:
The problem in my case is that I can't secure the things in the ceiling because the garage door has to open over top of them.
Click to expand...

Can you support the top of your posts from the wall? On one end of my fixture I did exactly that so that my garage door could still open. There's noreason they have to be secured at the ceiling. Screw a 2x4 flat onto the wall then send 2 pieces (in the form of a triangle) out to your post. This will fix the top of the post. If you don't know what I'm talking about send me a message and I'll send a couple pics for you. This combined with adhesive on the bottom was way more than adequate for me. Good luck.
 
adhesive

I used liquid nails for my wing stand and my fuselage stand. Took a bit more than one hammer blow to get it off. Works best if you hammer a putty knife thru the adhesive. Anyway, My wing and fuselage were both "old style" non-match drilled and the glue worked very well, my fuslelage stand did not move a mm in over 3 yrs. Bolts seem like way overkill.
 
prkaye said:
>> 9 Feet of 1x3 steel tube and 3 feet of angle

Is that for one wing post, or a pair?

>> I glued 2 x 6 wood blocks to the floor...

No holes, but how did you manage to get the adhesive off the floor?
Click to expand...


For one pair (I'm building 1 wing at a time). Each post is 4.5' tall and the angle was cut into 4 9" pcs.

The way I look at it is your going to have about $3000 worth of wing in the jig (not including your labor) and I wanted welds and bolts. I don't think I would be able to sleep at night if I just glued wood to the floor. It has obviously worked for some people I'm just saying that I wouldn't be comfortable.
 
Construction Adhesive worked well for me. Take care when removing the blocks, when I removed mine it took the top surface off the concrete.
Doug Gray
 
I agree with the liquid nails approach. I was skeptical. I anchored my wing stands to the ceiling with bolts but used liquid nails on the floor.

Another thing I would recommend is to get your spars up high. I got them to my shoulder level. The reason? The leading edges and tanks are assembled and riveted off of the wing. The overwhelming majority of the work done while the wings are in the 'jig' is aft of the spar. I would rather climb a stepladder occasionally as opposed to bending over the entire time you're working on the wings.

2004-05-23.65.jpeg


Also...make sure you get the wings far enough apart that you can get between them.

2004-09-14.204.jpeg
 
wings at same time

Looks like most people assemble both wings in parallel (at the same time). Has anyone here, becuase of space constraints, done one wing at a time? Is this a lot slower?

Jamie, I like how you've designed your posts to hold both wings at the same time. How much spacing do you uhave between the two wings?

How far apart are the two posts? The spar length minus some small amount?
 
Let's see, if my memory is correct the angles supporting the spars are supposed to be 114 inches apart (this will be different for your -9). On my -7 there was a drawing depicting this distance. I believe the angles I used were three feet long, purchased at Home Depot. They're steel and waaay strong enough for this application.
 
prkaye said:
Looks like most people assemble both wings in parallel (at the same time). Has anyone here, becuase of space constraints, done one wing at a time? Is this a lot slower?
I've only got mine in the stand one at a time because of space constraints. I am doing all of the prep work on the ribs and fabricating all of the parts at the same time. I've learned so much on the first wing, that I don't believe the second one will take much time at all. I will have to deburr and dimple after drilling, but pretty much everything else is already done. One advantage of assembling one at a time is that you only make mistakes once instead of twice. YMMV.
1374082554477a42296bb7.jpg


Guy
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Glue a three-legged A-frame to the floor. Provides lateral stability and overhead clearance. Gluing the jigs to the floor worked well for me. Drill if you want, but the liquid nails and wood was more than strong enough.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.