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dlomheim

Well Known Member
Is it standard practice to use structural pop rivets on the RV-3 horizontal trailing lower trailing edge? That is what we have on 80% of ours, and I don't recall ever seeing that on any 4's and I know it's not on my "9A". Still waiting on your plans to arrive so I can review the source document for answers to these questions...

Thanks.

Doug Lomheim
RV-3 (Engine pieces coming back from cleaning and inspection)
Rv-9a Mazda 13B / FWF (On hold til the "3" gets airborne :) )
 
It's not what I would call "standard" Doug - but if they are truly structural rivets, they shoudl be OK. What year was that airframe built? Things were a bit more primitive in the old days.
 
That's not on any RV-3 plans I've ever seen, and I have fairly old plans. Are the rivets too far forward and really close to the aft face of the HS spar? Maybe they thought they didn't have enough room to get the squeezer in there properly, so they just shot some pop rivets in. My HS spar rivet line was just a hair too far forward, so the squeezer was close enough to graze the primer if I wasn't careful. (But I WAS careful. :cool:)
 
Horizontal Rivets, etc.

KatieB said:
...Are the rivets too far forward and really close to the aft face of the HS spar?
Click to expand...

Katie...I think you're right about the builder being spooked about how close the rivet holes ended up being to the doubler plate, etc...they are pretty tight most of the way and about 2/3 appear to be structural "pop" rivets if I remember what they taught us in A&P school in '78-79 (no guarantee of that!).

Another thing I noticed was that the front of the horizontal is only held on by two bolts that go into a piece of angle aluminum on the top of the aft fuselage deck plate. That piece of angle aluminum has single bolts that attach it to the longeron pair that runs the length of the fuselage, but most of the other RV-s I've looked at (including my "9A"), also have a piece of angle "underneath the decking" that ties into the longeron. Is an angle aluminum piece not required under the decking on the "3"'s?

Thanks.

Doug
 
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dlomheim said:
Katie...I think you're right about the builder being spooked about how close the rivet holes ended up being to the doubler plate, etc...they are pretty tight most of the way and about 2/3 appear to be structural "pop" rivets if I remember what they taught us in A&P school in '78-79 (no guarantee of that!).

Another thing I noticed was that the front of the horizontal is only held on by two bolts that go into a piece of angle aluminum on the top of the aft fuselage deck plate. That piece of angle aluminum has single bolts that attach it to the longeron pair that runs the length of the fuselage, but most of the other RV-s I've looked at (including my "9A"), also have a piece of angle "underneath the decking" that ties into the longeron. Is an angle aluminum piece not required under the decking on the "3"'s?

Thanks.

Doug
Click to expand...

I am not at home to check Doug, but I beleive that is correct - the forward spar of the HS is just bolted to the longerons, and there is no "spreader" on the RV-3..
 
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