I riveted the rudder horn, bottom rib and one of the upper ribs to the spar. I was a bit fuzzy brained and riveted one of the holes next to the large hole without putting in nutplate in first. I drilled it out and put the same rivet back in the hole without the nutplate again! Major brain fart. On the second drill out I damaged the bearing surface and put the hole on the right of the large hole out of round. The hole dimensions were 0.128 in. X 0.140 in.
I thought about the ramifications of this and concluded that since the main function of the two rivets is to hold the nutplate in place, and these two rivets are the interior of a row of fastners this should be OK as is. Being on the interior, any shear load across that won't experience peaking loads like the end fasteners have. Also, because this is the rudder hinge attach point, the loading will be trying to pull the nutplate thru the assembly and not push it in. Therefore, these fasteners should not be critical. Of course, before I proceed any further I'll call Van's and run it by them.
Hole to right of large hole riveted and replaced three times.
