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Date:  6-23-2019
Number of Hours:  1.50
Manual Reference:  
Brief Description:  New Forward Skin

I was never happy with my drilling of the forward fuselage skin. When I built this piece, about ten years ago, the part was pretty much a piece of metal cut to the right outside shape. I had to layout all of the holes to match the pre-drilled holes in the mating bulkheads. The last three rivits on right aft were drilled too close to the edge for my taste. And, it didn't look right.

Since this is above the avionics bay it is one of the last things to be installed. I thought it woudl be a good metal working project for Cameron and would keep him busy for 3-4 days.

We orderred a new skin. I expected a lot of diffuclty in locating existing rivet holes and drilling the skin. I figured success was at best 50/50.

When we opened up the box today we were amazed to find that the kit now has pre-drilled holes for the skin. We quickly removed the original (painted) skin and clecoed up the new one. Amazingly all of the holes matched up - except the last three on the right. But, with a little persuasion we got it to cleco. I am thinking that the fuselage may be just a little wider at that station than it should be. But, buy starting the cleco from the rear and working forward, everthing fits.


So, instead of 4 days, Cameron knocked it all out in under 2 hours. Basic operations were to ream the hole to size, dimple and debur. We were both very happy.
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Dimpling the skin on the bench

Dimpling the skin on the bench

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Finished product - ready to install - but not for a long time

Finished product - ready to install - but not for a long time

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Perfect alignment of all holes

Perfect alignment of all holes

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