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Dave White RV-7 Build Site
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Date: 8-10-2014
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Number of Hours: 1.50
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Manual Reference:
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Brief Description: Prep'ing the wing spars
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Well, the empennage is just about finished - there are still a few key jobs to do, not least of which are the rolling of the elevator leading edges. I have to confess I'm not looking forward to that at all, since the rudder was such a pig. Other builders do report that the elevators are easier, but even so...
Anyway, I've put the empennage pieces to one side for now, to await calling Charlie, my inspector, to come and see what he thinks of my efforts. I've written him a summarised brief of the problems that I've recorded here, and will draw his attention to those as well as noting/fixing anything else that he picks up.
In the meantime, though, I need to maintain the momentum I've been developing, so I started to prepare for the next phase in the build - the wings. :-)
The first thing to do is to remove the protective plastic covering from the wing spars, put them on the bench and give them a good looking over. A primary task here is to mark them up properly: Whilst Van's supply them well identified as Left and Right, the important thing is to make sure they are clearly identified with the correct orientation. As the plans say: "You do not want to build a wing upside down." - that's a definite "Yup" from me.
The spars are an assembly of gorgeous aluminium prepared with an Alodine anti-corrosion treatment that gives them a lovely bronze colouration. They're very beefy (as you'd expect for an aerobatic aircraft), but surprisingly light all the same. The key parts of the spar assemblies are attached with much larger solid rivets than anywhere else on the aircraft, and which are quite possibly beyond the capabilities of my riveting equipment so it's good to have them pre-constructed at the factory. I've a lot of machining to do on them, and don't want any swarf to drop between the assembled parts, so the first step after a good inspection is to tape up the joints to protect against that. Electrical tape seems the prefered tool for the job amongst other builders, as it leaves less residue than ma
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Wings spars out of the box
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Orientations marked up
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Protective tape applied
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