Brief Description: Fitted LH tailcone side skin and closeout skin
Fitted LH tailcone side skin and closeout skin as follows:
1. Continued to drill the side skin gusset except for where the corner stiffener will be drilled. The corner stiffener will not affect the alignment of any of the other parts, since the aft end is now undrilled.
2. LH side skin was cleco'd to the bottom skin and the bulkhead tops cleco'd in place.
3. More parts were added, including the tailcone closeout skin and stiffeners. Once those were added, the tailcone needed to be leveled and prepared for drilling of the closeout skin to the longerons. In order to do that, the vertical stabilizer had to be cleco'd in place.
4. The vertical stabilizer was cleco'd in place. The tailcone longerons were laterally leveled and the stabilizer checked vertical, the transfer drilling of the closeout skin to the longerons was done. This was accomplished with two levels and a plumb bob. A long level was placed across the longerons at front end of the tailcone, and a shorter one at the rear. The rear of the tailcone was blocked up higher than the front to bring the top rudder hinge more vertical with the VS spar. That made the plumb bob easier to read. Once everything was leveled, the rear flange of the closeout skin was clamped to the rear bulkhead through the rudder cable holes.
5. Drilling of #40 holes in the closeout skin began from the rear, alternating sides and checking level every couple of holes. Once complete, the holes were enlarged to #30 and checked for level again. I will wait to ream the VS mounting holes to final size until everything is riveted together - just before putting the top skin on.
6. All parts were disassembled for prep and priming operations.
