Empennage

I got back from my 28 work days in Africa last Thursday evening. I had to go to the doctor in Oklahoma City on Friday to check into the Lazik surgery to correct my vision. Turns out my cornea is too thin for the 'cheap' procedure and I've also go a hole in the retina in my right eye. So the result of the visit is that I'll have the hole repaired next Friday, September 8th, along with a lens replacement in my left eye. The new lens will give me 20/20 vision and I shouldn't have to wear reading glasses for the up close vision. With the follow-up care after the surgeries it will be November before I can get the lens replaced in my right eye to complete the process and have good sight in both eyes.

Jim came down to spend the holiday weekend with us and sure wanted to go flying today. Unfortunately the weather didn't cooperate and it rained most of the day with the clouds sitting about 800' above the ground. I was able to get most of the honey-do's done through the morning hours and then about 2:30 I got out in the garage to re-acquaint myself with the RV project.

I'm ready to start on the Vertical Stabilizer so I pulled out the parts for the rear spar. There are three sets of hinge brackts, a spar doubler, and the rear spar itself. After I got the new drawing hung up on the wall I noticed that there is an 'optional' step to cut out some holes to eliminate some weight. I've been told that you should take every opportunity to save weight so I decided to cut out the holes. Of course I didn't have the tools to do it with so that meant a trip to the harware store to get some hole saws. There are 2 - 2" holes to cut and 5 - 1.5" holes. So I had to by two different hole saws for the task. I got back home and marked the centerline and then the position of the center of each hole. I drilled some pilot holes and then moved on to the drill press. I arranged the belts on the drill press for the slowest possible speed which is 300 rpm on mine. The actual drilling went quickly and easily. I figured that was a good first step to get me back on track for for the project.

2 Hours

Total hours on project = 62 hours