Fuse Side Skins

Fuselage

This chapter is probably the longest one remaining. One of the most dreaded things on the fuselage is the bending of the side skins. Here one skin has been prepaired with 'construction angles' which are removed after the bend.

The test fit after the bend: I am satisfied with the result.

Rahel helps with the prepairing of the second one - OK, if you look closely you see tht the bend has already been done. She is removing cleckos.

I was not able to bend it alone, but with the help of a child who did the twisting movement ir went very smooth.

Both rear skins test fitted with great result.

Here we are at the 1000 hour mark. Done in less than two years. I am mighty proud!

So in no more than three years we'll be flying ?!?

Priming is done, and now we start the riveting process. First is the...

Then the upper longerons ...

...and the lower longerons

On with the side skins.

This is one of the gotchas in this chapter. It is written nowhere that these nutplates should be riveted now. But you must do it now...

... otherwise you will never be able to set one nutplate river properly as it gets covered.

I used K1000-8 nutplates.

I caught this one thanks to the Matronics discussion group!

Here is another gotcha: Without trimming off material on the upper flange of the firewall stiffener you can neither drill nor rivet this - well, rivet. They must be trimmed on four places. Would have been much easier to do if done befor even riveted to the firewall (the stainless steel on the left side)

Here we have a boat. At least that's what a uninformed visitor thought at first.

Another gotcha: the nutplates installed on the bottom skin in section 26 should be postponed 'til after you have set the side skin rivets. As you see I had to drill out three of them.

I also had to modify my mushroom tool by taking away the rubber protection in order to set these rivets.

I got some rivet help from Anita - one of the youth group leaders (t2underground) in our church.

Hobbes Meter:

Fuse Side Skins
80.5 h