Empennage

Today I moved on to bending of the Left Elevator Tabs. This is a step that sounds a lot easier than it really is. I had to measure the dimensions and cut a block of wood to fit inside the elevator to approximate the bend angle of the elevator skin. I measured and marked the bend line perpendicular to the edge of the trim tab cutout. The plans call for you to offset the bend line by 1/32 inch inboard from the desired bend location. I wasnt really sure of why they wanted you to do that, but I did it in faith that the plans are correct. I had to go to town and get some double sticky sided tape to put inside the skin to help keep the wedge block from slipping. then I clamped the skin and blocks to the edge of the work table and started bending the tabs. The bottom tab was bent first as it resides inside of the upper tab. This is designed to shed water and prevent it from getting inside the elevator. When that was done I bent the other tab. The bends ended up exactly along the bend line so I guess I must have dobe it correctly.

The next step was to start riveting the Left Elevator. It was the same steps that I used to rivet the Right Elevator. E-703 to E-704; E-610PP & E-611PP and platenuts to E-702; E-705 to E-702; E-703;E-704 to E-702; WD-605-1-L to E-702 and E-705; The four rivets on E-713 to E-701; Placed E-714 inside E-713 with screws partially inserted; Inserted the elevator skeleton into the E-701-L/E-713; Then I cleco'd and riveted the E-701-L and E-713 to the understructure on the bottom side.

5 Hours

Total hours on project = 151