Okay, so now we're making progress, and I feel that I am in a position to purchase a new skin and try this again. What we did this evening was to clamp the bulkheads in an upright position so they could not move. Next I drilled pilot holes into the F810 aft bulkhead so I could match drill from the inside. Then we cleco'd the skin on the right side of the sfuselage to the longeron using the set of holes that were closest to the edge (i.e. the second set we drilled, not the first set). Next we match drilled the skin to the bulkheads from the inside working along the three bulkheads evenly until we got all the way over to the left side. Okay, so it didn't result in perfect alignment of that left side edge, but we now know where the differences lie. The skin, as cut per the instructions, is effectively too short at the front by 1/4" and too long at the back by almost an inch. If it wasn't for the fact that the right edge was correctly aligned with the longeron you'd probably conclude that the skin is not on straight. Except that I'm pretty sure it is. In any case, what we have decided is that we shall use this skin as a template to cut the new skin making it wider at the front and leaving it as it is at the rear; we will then trim once it is all drilled. To drill to the fuselage and 'ensure' a good fit we shall use the existing skin to match drill the two middle bulkheads and the longeron holes between them. The remaining longeron holes and bulkheads will be drilled in place. We believe that in this way we will obtain the very best fit we can and will be able to move forward on the project. Watch this space!! :-)
