Category Archives: Firewall

Time: 4 Hours

I got started in the Hangar around 9 this morning. The weather is perfect out, a few clouds in the sky and mid-70’s. I grabbed all the firewall parts off the paint rack and checko’ed them to the firewall while trying to be careful so I didn’t scratch the paint. I’m guessing it will take several weeks for it to cure fully. Most of the rivets I will be able to get with my back rivet set.

The riveting went well, only had to drill out a couple when the head slipped off the back rivet plate since there isn’t a lot if room between the firewall flanges.

I got most of the rivets done by lunch time and had offered my help to my buddy Glen to rivet the top skin on his RV-8 tail cone. I was really nervous running the rivet gun on his plane but everything turned out perfect.

You can see how tight it is in there to buck!

Decided to have dinner and sit by the fire pit at his house tonight so I will get back at the firewall tomorrow.

Time: 4 Hours

I got all the countersinking finished up today. I need to get better at reading the plans and the orientation of how parts line up. I spent some time trying to figure out two parts before I finally understood. This is due to the couple of months off if building I think. When I finished up that task I got right to scuffing all the surfaces for priming. I then cleaned all the parts and placed them in my painting table.

A couple of coats on all the sides and these will be ready for paint.

I will let the primer dry until tomorrow and get to painting. While I was cleaning up I decided to try to find all the parts for the next two steps in the build, the forward floor and gear towers. I found all but one part for the floor and gear towers. I will have to go through the parts to find that missing piece in the piles of aluminum that I have. I assembled the 2 gear towers to see what they look like.

I also received a couple of tools from Cleaveland tools and Avery tools. The really important one is the tungsten bucking bar! This is a really dense metal, more than gold, and makes for easy riveting according to everyone who uses them.

Time: 2 Hours

I try to get a little work done in the Hangar any chance I get. Today I spent a good part of the day visiting with some fellow builders over lunch and then to a visit to my friends shop to see the progress on his -8. It also have me a chance to take some more photos of some areas that I will be working on shortly. So when I finally got home I wanted to do a little work which only consisted of countersinking all the holes that match up to the dimples on the firewall that I did yesterday.

I decided that would be enough today as my lower back is a little sore from sitting at my workbench. I guess I need to recondition it like I had it all winter, having a couple of months off from building didn’t help I guess. Next up will be scuffing, cleaning, priming, painting and finally riveting all these pieces I have been working on.

Time: 5 Hours

Today started out with a few necessary errands that I had been putting off for a few days as I was too busy with the arrival of the fuselage. Once those were done I got right to work in the Hangar. I spent about an hour finishing up the edge deburring in the stainless steel firewall this stuff is pretty tough and requires more elbow grease to get the job done. After that I reassembled the firewall, stiffeners, spacers and engine mount brackets to match drill all the #30 holes as well as the 6 nutplate’s #40 holes that pass through the firewall.

I then disassembled all the parts and final drilled the nutplates in the stiffeners that don’t pass through the firewall. The plans then call for a 8° forward bend in the top of the firewall.

I took a measurement from the plans and marked a reference line on the flange side of the firewall. With a couple of 1×6″ boards cut to fit I clamped one to the lower side of the reference line and to the workbench. The other I just clamped to the firewall. This have me a leverage point to make a nice clean bend.

I then zeroed out my digital level to be able to tell when I hit 8°.

After a little pressure and tweaking I was able to get it spot on 8°.

Next up was to deburr all the holes in the firewall. Since the stainless steal is so hard you can wear out drill/deburr bits pretty fast. To help out you can use a lubricant like BoeLube, a Boeing made lubricant, to keep the bits cool and sharp.

I then marked off all holes in the firewall that I don’t want to dimple and dimpled the rest with the DRDT dimple machine.

That’s where I called it a day, next up will be to countersink all edges of the angles, supports and spacers for the firewall to accept the dimples. Then my first test at priming/painting to the final interior color.