RV-15 #43

[Nuisance]

Today I took delivery of my wing kit (sans front spars and other parts). Mark with Cunningham was great with a difficult delivery, major snowstorm in the Colorado mountains.

I will attempt to use this thread to document the build, and also I will post anything new I learn, etc.

John

 

[Nuisance]

I set up an old mac that I had as a plans display

 

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I am guilty of not keeping up with this. Although, I just got the last of the wing parts yesterday (main spars and mid flap tracks).

Ailerons are done, and flaps almost so. Now I can get after the wings.

 

[Nuisance]

When it came time to dimple the leading edge of the ailerons for the counter weight attachement, I got worried that the edges of the dimple die would make a bump in the curve of the leading edge. So, I rounded off the edge of the die so that wouldn't happen. Also, I used my C-frame to hold the die on the upside-down rivet bar.

 

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I built this wing rotator to help me paint the wings of my cub. I used it to help build the fuselage too. I only had to move the mounts about two inches to adapt to the RV spar spacing.

 

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When I cleckoed the leading edge skins, I did it in the vertical position, and it seemed easier to just walk around and around doing one row at a time.

 

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Being a speed demon, I really wanted to flush rivet the leading edges. I wrote Marc and asked him how it went, and he said "make sure you have a skilled partner". Well, my old riveting partner from the RV8 days (Frank Hutchins) is no longer with us, and I didn't want to break in a new one on a difficult project like this.

After much consternation, I realized I could flush rivet just the stiffener. I cleckoed the 3 leading edge skins together, and then cleckoed the stiffener on, and I was able to fit the whole thing to the wing skeleton. So I took it back off, and I back riveted the stiffener to the skins, leaving the three skins cleckoed together until I carried the whole thing over to the wing. It was fairly easy to carry since the center piece is .032" and pretty stiff, and the root piece is .025, and the tip piece is .020. It went on the skeleton with the only change being that I started cleckoing the first row on the top side rather than the bottom. I think it came out really nice, and only leaves rows of rivet heads sticking up that are in line with the slipstream. I was also able to flush rivet the landing light bracket with a deep squeezer.

 

[Nuisance]

I decided that after flush riveting the stiffener (forward of the spar and on top of the wing), I needed to do something about the inspection plates that are on the bottom of the wing, and also ahead of the spar. Like all the inspection plates and the ports for the fuel tanks, the plans have them secured with round-head 8-32 screws. 12 in each plate. I decided it would be safe to use flat head screws instead.

I suppose I should add a disclaimer that these mods are mine alone, and are not approved by Van's Aircraft.