Spent 1 hr drilling 4 holes. Well not exactly. After checking, re-checking, and checking again (see previous entry) I drilled the 4 holes in the aft spar of the horizontal stabilizer to the fuselage stab attach bars. I drilled to #30 per the plans and cleco'd as I drilled. Next was to measure the tips of the horizontal to a reference point on the fuse. I used F805 bulkhead and the measurements were 87 9/16 on each side after I aligned everything and clamped it down on the front spar of the stab. I started laying out the location of the holes that need to be drilled to tie the stab spar to the fuselage and was disturbed by the lack of edge spacing that the plans called for. The outboard attach holes go through the stab, the aft deck, the F810 bulkhead, and then the longeron. The longeron is 3/4" and the plans called for drilling the hole 1/2" into the longeron with a #12 (3/16) drill which didn't leave much room for error on the edge of the longeron. Time to stop and do some research on this one.
Horizontal stab awaiting drilling
Drilling the aft spar of the horizontal stab to the stab attach bars.
Aligned, clamped, and marked for drilling - but not so fast....
