I came home early to work on the plane. I promptly made my first bonehead rookie mistake. I clecoed the spar reinforcements to the spar channels with 3/33nd clecoes and started match drilling the reinforcements and the spar channels. When I started moving the clecoes to drill, they kept popping out. After some head scratching, I finally figured out that I was using the wrong cleco size. I needed 1/8 inch clecoes. I ordered 175 (that is the amount they said I would need) from Avery. Then, I dashed over to Wayne Whittaker’s house and borrowed a few cup fulls from him. I then re-clecoed the whole assembly and redrilled. Everything looked fine (no oblong holes) so it looks as though I dodged a bullet. I then match drilled the elevator hinge brackets as well as the center bracket with the sandwiched bearing. I squeezed (squoze ?) the first rivets of the project to put the center bracket together. I hand squeezed the first two rivets and then Mark and I squeezed the rest with the pneumatic rivet squeezer. It came out beautifully. Mark and I then triumphantly marched the first completed part throughout the house on uplifted hands to show the queen. She seemed suitably impressed. Not one to rest on my laurels, I started the front spar assembly by match drilling the reinforcement angles to the spar channels. I then sawed, filed, sanded and scotchbrite wheeled the reinforcement angles to taper them as per the plans. They came out good.
HS rear spar with clecoes
Using the pneumatic squeezer to set the rivets in the elevator hinge brackets
My son, Mark, sets a ceremonial rivet in the elevator hinge brackets.
