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Jeff & Jackie's RV-8 Project
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Date: 6-23-2007
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Number of Hours: 5.00
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Manual Reference: 8-24 / 8-25
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Brief Description: Aft fuselage assembly
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I can't believe it! I've run out of clecos again: silver ones this time. I like to put a cleco in every other hole to ensure good alignment, but I have around 500 or more of these things and they are all used up!! I also can't believe how long is has taken me just to cleco the after fuselage together: what a mission!
Today was frustrating. I was working alone, since Jackie is at university today, and since I couldn't face all that deburring and edge-finishing I decided to get on with assembling the tailcone to the fuselage. Well, the two sides went ok, but getting the bottom skins on was just a nightmare. The F-811 bulkhead just wouldn't sit around the mid-longerons too well and several iterations of filing the slot were required. I also had to deepen the notch in the longerons ever so slightly as well to clear the VS attach bars.
After wrestling with that I then fitted the bottom skin: well, *nothing* lined up right. More wrestling, and eventually I got there. I have to say though, the order in which Vans tells you to assembly things SUCKS! You spend all that time cleco-ing the longerons, bulkheads and side skins in place and then the instructions say "oh yeah, you have to put the skin between those two bits". Aaarrrggghhhh...!
On the bright side; two bright sides actually; I know have a fuselage that does actually look like a fuselage, and the eupper F-887 longerons fitted quite well. Although not absolutely exact, very little force is needed to push them where they need to be, so I don't think I'll attempt to tweak the bends in case I screw things up. On the down side: look at all those holes that need drilling, deburring & dimplling (or countersinking)! :-(
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F-887 longerons fit nicely!
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A fuselage! How cool is that?!
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This is a neat view... :-)
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