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Jims RV-8
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Date:  1-12-2014
Number of Hours:  2.00
Manual Reference:  7-9
Brief Description:  Wing skin - Final lap joint work

With the top skin getting rivets very soon I wanted one more look at the transition smoothness for the lap joint so I clecoed on the top skins and did a final assessment of how much more smoothing was needed. I went ahead and smoothed the inner and outer skins at that joint with the scotchbrite wheel in the cordless drill. When I felt they were both ready I rolled the edges of both with the wooden stick and clecoed them back on the wing. I was really happy how smooth the transition from leading edge to top skin is…it came out nice.

Also needed before riveting top skins on is for the tank to be temporarily installed, held in place by about half the screws is what they recommend. I will still need to take the tanks off to wire the fuel sending unit, but I want a “true” fit, so I will be using more than half the screws. There are 80 or so screws that go around the trailing edge of the fuel tank and another 18 that connect the z brackets to the spar. I first hand tightened all of the z bracket screws before tightening them up…when I did so, the tank overlapped the leading edge ever so slightly, maybe 1/16”. Hmmm… so I backed off of the z-bracket screws and installed / tightened the trailing edge screws first (about half of them). Then I installed the z-bracket screws. Some of them didn’t go in exactly perpendicular at first but with the trailing edge screws and the z-bracket screws in all the way, things snugged up nicely and the tank fits great. I will still send an email to Van’s to make sure they are ok with my methodology, but for now it will be fine.

I also marked the skins with the proper rivet type and clecoed them on the right wing, with a cleco in every other hole. Next step – top skin rivets!
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a good fit

a good fit

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ready for skins

ready for skins

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