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More First Rivets

Tumper

Tumper

Well Known Member
This goes out to Philippe (installed first rivets last weekend) and Alexis down under (installing first rivets soon) and any other guys beginning their first rivets in the HS spar.

I did it, drove and squeezed my first rivets this weekend. It really feels great to be putting something together permanently (I hope). A big thanks go out to my brother that loaned me his pneumatic rivet squeezed for this project. I squeezed the long rivets on the mount brackets by hand and WOW that hurt. And I am a guitar/bass player also. Either the handles on my squeezer aren?t long enough or? well we want go in to what else could be the problem, but needless to say I don?t want to hand squeeze many rivets.

I have included a couple of pictures.

P.S. The spar looks just as good on the back side.

img0805smallzs7.jpg

img0802smallkg0.jpg
 
first rivets

Way to go Dean. Lookin' real good there! Keep up the good work and you will fly what you are building - and that's pretty darned neat in my book!!!
 
Nice ;) Good work!

By the way, I finished riveting the left sking to the ribs and spar... and I have a recommendation for you :

Install the "inboard no ribs to spar doubler to spar to shim to main rib" 1/8 rivets BEFORE you install the nose ribs in the skin.

See those 3 1/8 rivets... the ones to the left of the HS-908 angle... they are a pain to install. You need to use a double-offset set... I had to drill one of those and it was not pretty Had to use the 12" drills and it was a pain. It took so much time to rivet (you have to pump up the pressure because of the offset set) that the head desintegrated!
DSC03197.JPG

DSC03204.JPG


Van's instructions are :
1-Rivet the 3 nose ribs in the skin
2-Rivet the 2 main ribs that have no associated nose ribs to the spar (meaning rivet the ribs #2 and #4 to the spar)
3-Rivet the spar to the skin
4-Rivet the inboard rib(#5) to spar while not forgetting the shim(the 3 rivet...)
5-Rivet (pop rivet) the middle rib to the spar (#3)


I recommend doing the following :
1-Rivet the 2 OUTBOARD nose ribs to the skin
2-Rivet the 2 main ribs that have no associated nose ribs and the inboard rib (#2, #4 and #5) to the main spar (the difficult rivets)
3-Rivet the 3rd nose rib...
4-Rivet the spar to the skin
5-Rivet (pop rivet) the middle rib to the spar (#3)

And don't do what I did... leave the holes open on the inboard nose rib and main rib for the fairing... I had to drill them out...I'm getting really good at that..

By the way, you can visit my website's gallery
http://www.llavalle.ca/gallery/v/rv9/empennage/

My website is in french but the gallery has no text ;)
 
good work guys! you are ahead of me. i'm just going to dimple the ribs and skins now and then rivet the spars soon.
i'll have to read ahead about the riveting procedure. i was wondering about the fairings... what you do there? i saw on the drawings the rivets are marked differently.

keep up the great work!!:D
 
yeah, i'll leave them open but i was wondering more about what went on there...(nutplate) and if the rib gets dimpled the same as the rest.

looks like you are cruising right along on the tail section!!

great job!
 
SWIXTT

If you look at the section “Things I Wish I'd Done While Building” there is a comment from “F1ROCKET” <Screw wing tips on instead of glassing and filling the cracks. Over time, they crack and chip the paint. I think a nice straight line with stainless screws looks better anyway. Oh, and it takes less time and less mess too.>

I haven’t read this far a long in the instructions but screwing the tips on sounds like a good idea to me. Is this your question?

FYI, I have dimpled the end holes on the skin assuming a countersunk screw for the tips later.

Dean Eiland
RV-9
 
thanks Dean, i'll go and have a read through there. that does sound like a nice way of doing the tips. i was actually referring to the inward ribs and the 10 holes left open for the tail fairing. how those get attached. just wondering if those got dimpled or just left flat for ease of attachment later on.
how far along are you?

adios

Tumper said:
SWIXTT

If you look at the section ?Things I Wish I'd Done While Building? there is a comment from ?F1ROCKET? <Screw wing tips on instead of glassing and filling the cracks. Over time, they crack and chip the paint. I think a nice straight line with stainless screws looks better anyway. Oh, and it takes less time and less mess too.>

I haven?t read this far a long in the instructions but screwing the tips on sounds like a good idea to me. Is this your question?

FYI, I have dimpled the end holes on the skin assuming a countersunk screw for the tips later.

Dean Eiland
RV-9
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