Monthly Archives: January 2016

Site Update

This entry was posted in Uncategorized on by

My apologies to anyone who may have been trying to access my site over the past few days. I realized that the old site was not completely responsive on mobile, so I wanted to update it accordingly. In the process I became distracted and decided to completely redo the look and format. The organization of the site remains the same, but there have been several improvements. The site is now completely responsive and displays beautifully on tablets and mobile devices. Furthermore, I made a static home page with snippets of recent posts.

If you check out the media page you will see I now have gallery viewers for both Vimeo and YouTube channels. The photos are gone. There are just too many to keep up with. When N9FX flies, I’ll go back and make a slideshow of the best photos along the way. Until then… no more photos on the media page.

Additionally, you will notice that photos now pop out instead of linking to a image source page. This looks great on a desktop, but I’m always a little leary of this feature on mobile devices. It works ok on my iOS device, but I’ve not tested on anything other than the iPhone 6 screen size.

Also, I added a page for an Amazon a-store. I’ve added every item I’ve bought for the RV project to the list of items on that page. If I didn’t buy it, I didn’t put it on there. If you have questions about anything, such as why I bought a particular product, let me know.

I also made several behind the scenes tweaks. I divided the function for totaling hours between the three categories of build, flying, and maintenance. (Previously while three were shown, I was only calculating one). I also customized the input panel to streamline it for my RV build. I also created a child theme and linked it to a git repository so that my custom code isn’t over-ridden by updates, and so that I can implement some version control. There are several other under the hood changes that I’m sure only I care about. 🙂

All in all, I’m very happy with the new look. One day this site will be more than just my build log, and I want to maintain as much functionality as possible. Cheers – PLB

Service Bulletin 14-01-31 (3)

This entry was posted in Empennage Horizontal Stab on by

Today was the monthly EAA Chapter meeting. So that ate into my plane building time. My goal was to completely remove both angles from the from spar. Unfortunately, this meant dealing with the problem rivets from my previous session. I didn’t take any pictures during removal, but here are several photos from after the fact. The method I used for the trouble rivets was a file and super small drill bits. I filed them down as smooth as I could, and then using a punch and a small drill bit slowly worked the bit back to center. Eventually I was able to get them out. Every single rivet came out without having to enlarge the holes in the spar.

One hole in one angle is slightly enlarged. The following two photos are provided as a comparison for the slightly enlarged hole. The first photo has a 1/8″ punch inserted in a hole without any expansion.

The second has the same 1/8″ punch inserted in the slightly expanded hole. I’m undecided what to do about this.


A slight deformation from removing the last rivet in the spar on the bottom. Nothing to worry about.

Here are the two trouble rivets. The hole is not oblong all the way through, but the top looks a little nasty. I’m considering replacing this angle.

Here are both of the angles from above. The zoomed in photos above may make the problems look worse than they are.

Service Bulletin 14-01-31 (2)

This entry was posted in Empennage Horizontal Stab on by

I completed drilling out all of the rivets holding the four ribs to the skin. With the proper tools and techniques, this is a breeze. The technique I use is this.

First I drill the rivet head out with the special rivet removal tool. This tool has different size heads and bits that fit perfectly over the head of a rivet to ensure that the drill bit remains centered and parallel the the rivet. Additionally, it ensures that you drill to the appropriate depth.

Secondly, I pop the head of the rivet off with the appropriately sized punch. In this case 3/32″.

And finally, I use a center punch to pop the remaining rivet out. In many instances it is very beneficial to use a clamp close to the rivet. This is particularly true towards the ends of the ribs. This prevents the rib from bending or deforming, and also ensures you don’t get any spring back. Spring back makes the center punch pack less energy, and as a result you may require more attempts, and more opportunities for deformation.

Now that the easy rivets were done, it was time to move onto more challenging rivets. For these rivets I used the 90 degree angle adaptor. To ensure I was centered on each rivet, I first used the center punch to mark the center point. I then used the deburring bit to make a nice perfectly centered divot for the drill bit to rest in. This doesn’t make drilling fool proof but it certainly increases the odds.

Again, clamps are useful for preventing deformation and making the center punch more effective.

I was able to get all four ribs removed fairly quickly. All the rivet removals went flawlessly except for one that was just enlarged by a small fraction. I’m not concerned, as its barely noticeable.
  

After removing all the rivets in the center section, for which there is easy access, it was time to move onto the most challenging rivets to remove. Those connecting the angles to the front spar inside the leading edge of the horizontal stab. I didn’t think my rivet removal tool would work due to the narrowing angle of the leading edge. However, with enough finesse and a dose of patience i was able to get it work using the 90 degree drilling attachment.

As you can see the results are almost flawless. I still need to remove these rivets.  

Unfortunately, on the second angle, those furthest outboard were more difficult, and I would up with three rivets that were off center. Luckily they are not deep, and if they touch the angle, they only do so barely.   

It was very difficult with the angle and hand position to determine that I was off center. Everything looked centered. I’m not entirely sure how I’m going to resolve these rivets. Potential courses of action are 1) grind or file the heads down in some way, 2) drill from the backside on the shop heads, or 3) attempt to use smaller bits to move the holes to the center. If there is a fourth or fifth option, I haven’t figured it out yet. I decided this was the perfect stopping point for the evening, as I could think about the problem and do some research before tackling it tomorrow.

So far, this service bulletin is going fast, and successfully. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that I can surmount these three problem rivets. If I cannot, I will simply replace this angle. Thankfully, this angle is the top angle, and will not require the back drilling to the fuselage that the bottom angle would require.