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Dave's RV-7A Builder's Log
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Date: 4-16-2011
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Number of Hours: 2.50
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Manual Reference:
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Brief Description: Attached horizontal stabilizer
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After working on the elevators for a couple of hours, I decided to go ahead and drill for the bolts that attach the horizontal stabilizer. I figured that I had already drilled my bad hole for the day, so what could possibly go wrong? Before getting started with the drill, I had a number of rivets to set--there are two places where the fore and aft spars cross the aft deck that doublers are riveted in place, and I had decided to wait to rivet these until later to ensure that I didn't put a rivet in hole that wasn't supposed to get one.
LOTS of plans study before firing up the compressor and riveting. By this stage in the project I'm not really surprised at how long it can take to set 10 or 20 rivets...sometimes one rivet can take a few minutes just trying to find the right bucking bar and making sure the job is done right. Rivets done, time to drill.
After measuring the stab tips to the fuselage about five times to ensure it was even, I clamped it in place, measured it again, and then measured for the bolt holes. The two outermost holes must go through the center of the longeron...which of course is completely hidden from view, so I used the row of rivets running fore and aft that attach the aft deck to the longeron as a reference. I figured that those rivets were centered, so the bolts would be too. Turns out I was right.
The four aft bolts were easy since I had pre-drilled the holes in the F-711 attach bars way back when I was working on that bulkhead. I simply checked the incidence at 0 degrees by putting a 3/8" shim under the aft spar and match drilling through the spar. With the exception of the vertical stab, I think I'm about done with putting holes in my carefully made airplane parts.
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Holes through spar and aft deck
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Bolts in place, no going back now
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View from aft of horizontal stab attach bolts
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