S09 - Elevators

Got the parts dimpled and countersunk last night as well as deburred. Not too much to write about. It all came out fine like normal.

I spend a little bit of time this weekend working on getting the bend right on the lower portion of the trim tab skin. My initial go at it was still kind of wavy. I went to bed but didn’t like how it turned out. The next night after work Read more…

I got the trim tab holders cut out from some spare wood that I had laying around. Even though I had to cut them by hand instead of some kind of template, etc it still came out pretty good. After doing all that work I realized I should have used Read more…

I got a short amount of time last night to get the weights trimmed a bit more and install them. I’ve never worked much with lead, but it was amazing how easy it was to cut. I got a box cutter to trim the burrs off of the edges and Read more…

I got a tiny bit of time to get the front edge of the elevators rolled and then riveted. I also got the change to cut the basic shape of the counterbalance weights. I still need to get them smoothed out some and grind off just a tiny bit more. Read more…

I got the trailing edges sealed up today. I put the pro seal on on Friday and it sat all weekend long until today to cure. That was basically just over 36 hours. I’m getting better at trailing edge work, but I still slip with too much pressure through the Read more…

I spent my time after work finishing up the riveting on the rear spar and completing all of the front spar riveting. The Cleaveland Tools bucking bar was awesome! It follows the design that Van’s Aircraft puts in the manual and I can see why they have that. It was Read more…

I spent alot of time this weekend getting to where I am now. It started on Friday afternoon with dimpling more skins, deburring a bit more on the skin edges, and just getting all of the parts ready for priming the following day. Saturday was doing some of the skin Read more…

My backordered VA-140 arrived a month or so ago and I finally started back up on the build. I took a break from building to get a shed built in our backyard. This was going to free up more space in the garage and it has been a huge help! Read more…

I got the skin dimpling done for the left side. I noticed that one of the holes must not have been drilled out when I was match drilling. I’ll have to reassemble that area and then drill that hole. Everything went pretty smoothly though. I didn’t have a good idea Read more…