Follow my Journey of building a Vans RV-8 Aircraft
Time: 6 Hours
No photos today just an update on the progress. My flight schedule has had me on several multi-day trips over the last couple of weeks. So my progress has been slow but steady. My goal is to knock out two ribs every chance I get. So the work continues and I’ll update when I get to the next steps.
Time: 2 hours
No photos today as you have seen my deburring skills already. This is the order of tasks that I need to accomplish on every rib.
1 – Deburr the lightening holes, edges and tab cuts.
2 – Scuff all surfaces.
3 – Straighten flanges to 90°.
4 – Straighten the ribs by fluting.
5 – Prime
6 – Assemble
Right now I’m just doing steps 1-2 which take a long time for each rib! I will move on to the next steps after this big chore is finished!
I had several ideas of vinyl sticker that I wanted to put on my truck to show that I’m an RV-8 guy. I couldn’t find one online that I liked so I researched how to make one. What I came up with was buying a Silhoutte Cameo cutter. This device looks like a regular computer printer but has a blade instead if ink.
This cutter will cut anything from vinyl to fabric and paper. So I found a online store that had a RV-8 sticker that I wanted to start with (I bought a set from them at $15 so I could use the design just for me rather than just copying them, I think that’s the right thing to do!). The software that comes with the cutter is pretty awesome and allows for a lot to be done. So I bout some good outdoor vinyl from H&H Sign online store in silver to match my truck. After playing around this is the final product, a little bigger than the ones I bought and has my reserved tail number cut out too!
So what else could I do, well I have made templates of possible avionics that I want and cut them from black card stock so that I can mix and match them on a full size layout of the instrument panel.
Then I learned that they also do print and cut. What you do is design within their software and print on a regular printer. Then you bring it back to their cutter and based on some registration marks it printed it cuts it out perfectly!
I made a life size cutout of the panel out of foam board and painted it a satin gray that I’m contemplating for a final color. Now I have a board and avionics outlines to try different ideas.
I have to tell you I’m a geek at heart and toys like this make me happy! I have created a few stickers and I’m working on designs for my RV-8 paint scheme. Here is the second that I made for my daughter Ellie as she is 8 and now in competitive gymnastics!
Here is one that I made for the girlfriend as her youngest is in his first year in the NAVY.
So now I’m playing around with making labels for my instrument panel and switches. I have found a few settings that make a nice label especially in such a small font. I will work on these and perfect it I hope. The vinyl I’m using is Oracal 651, and has a 5-8 year outdoor life span. This stuff sticks real well!
The one on the left is gloss and the right satin. More to come!
Called Van’s last week to check up on the shipping status of my wings (they should have shipped on Monday). Barb said they were a little behind and were just waiting on the leading edge skins to be cut. That will be done this Monday so shipping should happen by the end of the week hopefully. I’ll keep my fingers crossed as I’m chomping at the but to get riveting again! 🙂
Time: 6 Hours
After taking care of some work realated business I was able to get into the hangar after lunch. To start was to rivet the substructure of the left elevator. This job went pretty smooth with the help of the pneumatic squeezer. I did have one rivet get damaged due to the die in the squeezer slipping off the head as I pulled the trigger. So out came the drill and I replaced it without too much trouble.
Once you have the substructure all riveted together its time to slip it into the skin. Before you can do that you need to add a “gum wad size” of RTV silicon at the ends of the stiffeners. This helps with vibration cracks in the future.
You rivet the entire skin except the top flange of the trim tab spar, as you have to wait until you are ready to rivet the hinge with it. So I added some blue tape to remind me to not rivet these holes.
I riveted every other hole then removed the cleko’s and finshed the rest.
The four outboard most rivets on the trim spar call for MK-319-BS blind rivets, but I was able to get the first two with my 4″ no-hole yoke in the pneumatic squeezer. So just the last two are bling rivets on the top and bottom.
After I finished riveting the skin I did a once over to check all my work and found that the last rivet on the inboard bottom had swelled between the skin and rib. This is due to the flange and skin not being tight together and allowing the rivet to swell in between as well as under the flange. So I drilled it out and figured it was due to me not being able to get a good squeeze on it. So I admitted defeat and used a blind rive as it will never be seen once painted.
All finished except for the trim tab.
Next up was to bend the trailing edge of the trim tab. So I brought out the wood brake that I built. It took just a few pushes on the brake and the bend was complete.
As I discussed before my plan was to avoid the bending of the ends of the trim tab. I bought a couple extra ribs to cut up and make riblets for each end of the trim tab. I decided to take on the longer side first as it would have to be cut on an angle.
I had to cut a relief into the top of the riblet to be able to sit inside of the tab spar.
Next up was the smaller side which had a straight cut and the same relief detail.
Once I was satisfied with the fit and how they turned out I broke out the dremal and cutting wheel.
Here is the fit after the trim tab ears were trimmed off and the riblets were touched up. I matched drilled both ends and found only one error on my part. The bottom of the trim tab has two horns that are riveted to the tab and make for an attach point for the electric trim. One hole was off by 1/16″ causing a figure eight shape. So I will treat that hole as a normal hole and add another rivet next to it. This piece only has 2 rivets in it normally so I will have a little extra with three.
Next up will be to tackle the trim tab hinge. This is a little bit of a bear to make sure everything lines up and you maintain good gaps. I was in the hangar for 6 hours and figured I was a little tired and this was a good place to call it a night.
