It's been a while since I last worked on the plane. I've been busy building a 4' X 8' work table in my garage. I also bought a router, and router table. I'm hoping to use the router for cutting the sides off some of the "U" channel stock, and possible scratch building some of the plane. I've seen a router used for cutting out wing ribs very accuately.
While surfing the web, I found a builder that used hardwood for bending some of the parts. I bought some 1.5" thick Ash and using my new router, and a 1/2" roundover bit, I made one of the edges a 1/2" radius.
This is the bend radius that is called out for the Rudder Drive Horn.
I started out by clamping it in a vise as shown, but found that there was too much flex in table/wood/vice combination to get a solid hit with the mallet. So I laid the wood flat on the corner of the work table, and pounded it the rest of the way.
I was quite concerned about making this part because I saw another builder ruined two of them. As far as I can tell, mine came out exactly to plan specs. I'm very happy so far with using radiused hardwood.
By the way, the 2 hours I show for this part included quite a bit of edge polishing. I wanted to remove all stress risers before bending. pilot drilled all the holes.
