Today was more work on the rudder. I had fabricated and deburred the rudder skin stiffeners a while back, now was the time to match drill them to the skins. The skins are only 0.016 inches thick, and are very delicate. Mine were still attached to the bottom of the box they shipped in, which is the safest place to keep them until ready. I started with the right skin. Since I was leaving the protective plastic on, I labeled one set of stiffeners with an R suffix, since I would not be able to use sharpie marks.
Cleaned off and vacuumed the bench, then started with stiffener A. The plans recommend drilling into your bench top and clecoing directly into it, which is what I did. The first few stiffeners were a little stubborn to line up with the holes in the skin by the time I got the opposite end of where I started. Then I drilled and clecoed the first and last hole of the rib first. This made a big difference and the ribs lined up much better. Next step was to disassemble and debur the holes. The instructions warn about deburring the skins. I did the skins manually using my hands and not the electric screwdriver, doing one turn per hole.
Get a partner before you do this step. Have one person drill, the other cleco. It will save a lot of time.
