First thing this morning, I went out and corrected the issues. The timing couldn't be better, since I was going to remove the control surfaces anyway to mate the wings. First the flaps came off. This was a royal pain because for some reason I had the hinge pin bends on the inside...which is where they'll be for the permanent installation, but it sure makes removing the pins difficult. Until I'm ready to fly, I'm going to install the pins from the outside to make it easier.
Next I removed the ailerons. Feels weird to take things apart.
Here's one of the culprits...a universal head where it should have been a flush head rivet. Can you believe this nice guy found that? Even though the aileron has the spec'ed travel and then some, the nose skin did hit this rivet at the extreme position. Same deal on the outboard bracket. One little rivet callout slipped my attention!
Here's the other thing, and this one is a complete brain fart. The plans call for these five rivets along the side of the hinge bracket. I swear I remember seeing that long side flange and thinking, man, there should be some rivets there. But I also remember scouring the drawings and not seeing the rivets called out. Well, I looked again, and there was one tiny reference where the drawing had been TORN, believe it or not, pointing to another drawing that had the callouts. Sheesh. Can't believe I missed that. So I drilled these five holes and put solid rivets in there. It was not exactly fun to have to reach in through the lightening holes to buck these. Not hard at all, just a pain on my wrists...just when you thought you were done bucking rivets through lightening holes... 8^)
So anyway, here's the flush rivet on the inboard hinge bracket. Much better. Jen shot these while I reached all the way up through the inspection panel hole. Reminiscent of wing skin riveting...I don't miss it.
Ok, now back to wing mating. Prior to this point, when I inserted the aileron pushrods in the wings, I duct taped over the wing rib flanges so they wouldn't scratch the pushrod. But this wing was about to be flipped and tipped all over, so I'm going with a different approach here. I basically "suspended" the pushrod in the hole and bolted the outboard end to the bellcrank. That way the pushrod can't hit the ribs. Worked like a charm.
Jen helped me lift the right wing out of the cradle and onto a sheet of plywood laid over my creeper. That way I can roll the wing around to where I need it. If you do this, be careful of the fuel tank drain, since it protrudes out the bottom.
Next Jen and I relocated the fuselage to the ready-for-mating position. The garage door can still close, but I pulled the cord out of the outlet just in case.
I levelled across the longerons at F-704, and also levelled on F-704 itself, both front and rear. Got it down to zero.
The garage floor dips lower at the door, presumably for drainage, so I had to shim under the left side with a piece of plywood (a chunk of an old desk, actually).
A tiny shim on top of the sawhorse under the tailcone brought the longerons level longitudinally as well. Level all around.
The wing is ready. Waiting on you, Jen...
For some reason, I had been procrastinating making an inboard wing support...but it's definitely something you need. The inboard support keeps the spar from "dragging" inside the center section as you insert it. Measured the optimal height and started scrounging around for things I could stack or use instead of having to build something...yes, I'm tired of building temporary stands just to scrap them! I came inside and it hit me...the base of an office chair would be perfect! I could adjust it to where I need it, and it naturally rolls around smoothly. I haven't seen anybody use a rolling chair base yet, so I'm happy to take full credit for the idea! At its maximum height it was just slightly low, so I put a piece of wood on there and put a rag on top to protect the skin (folded over here so you can see the wood). Again, be careful of the fuel tank drain if you do this.
I got Jen fired up and we went to it. We lifted the wing onto the chair on the inboard end and onto the castering "post stand" at the tip. The chair plus plywood was exactly the right height as I guided the spar into place. Oh yeah...I dabbed some Lubriplate on the fore and aft faces of the spar doublers to help the "penetration" along. The fit is tight to say the least. Once the spar was worked in about an inch, I had Jen lean into the other side of the fuselage so it wouldn't slide, and I took the wing and did the wiggle-push-wiggle-push thing. "It's going in...it's going in," Jen was saying. Ok, I'll leave that one alone...too easy. Once it got in to the point where the rear spar hit the F-705 "fork", I had to spread the fork slightly while Jen wiggled and pushed the wing. Much easier than I thought. I had noticed how the F-705 spar fork was slightly narrower than the doubled rear spar, and I figured it would be more difficult than it was to get the spar in there. Not really. I took over the wing wiggling and pushing from there until it seemed "about right."
In the end I got out my little mirror (that Jen recently donated to me permanently from her purse) and scoped out the situation with the bolt holes. They were really, really close. I managed to get one drift pin into the lower inboard 7/16" hole...just some light tapping and it was in. It was obvious that the wing needed less dihedral for the other holes to line up, and the castering "post stand" was a little too tall. I ended up taking the stationary portion of the stand off the dolly and put some chunks of 2x4 and plywood on top of it until it looked about right (actually Jen did this while I scoped the bolt holes). Got it to a point where I could get a drift pin in, and it went in almost all the way by hand...really good fortune there. I tapped the 1/4" drift pins into place while Jen wiggled the wing tip. I tapped out one drift pin at a time and replaced it with a temporary hardware store bolt...and that was that!
Wow. Pretty cool. The chair under the inboard edge is no longer serving any purpose...I should have removed it for a more dramatic picture, but oh well.
Here's the setup inside...two of each type bolt in place with nuts tightened just hand tight, to maybe 25 inch-pounds. I took out the other drift pins to use on the other wing. You can see the array of things I needed handy to get this done...most importantly the drift pins and the rubber mallet. By the way, it's amazing how rigid the wing and fuselage are, even with just these four bolts barely tightened and no rear spar or forward tank support! It's really mind-boggling.
Ok, now for some shots after the fact, so you can have a decent idea of what this looks like. For me, I had no pictures whatsoever of this process, just good advice from other builders. Here's the wing root area. I haven't done anything about incidence or sweep yet, but I believe it must be close due to the extremely tight fit of the spar and carry-through. Anyway, the gap up front is nice and wide for running fuel/vent plumbing and stuff.
Here's a close-up of the gap just above the spar. It's about 3/16". Those rivets just above and around the cutout have me a little concerned. I followed the plans to the letter and used universal head rivets, but that's where the wing root fairing rubber channel will rest. I might want to swap those out for flush head rivets...we'll see.
This is the view from the front and below. You can pretty clearly see the bit of dihedral and how the fuselage belly skin overlaps the lower wing skin. There's about a 3/16" gap below the spar, between it and the belly skin.
Here's the rear spar joint. Again, I haven't done anything about incidence or sweep yet, since I'm waiting until the other wing is on for that, but it sure doesn't look like there will be any edge distance issue for drilling the 5/16" hole here. And it looks like trimming the rear spar end exactly according to the plans worked out perfectly. Please ignore the smiles on the flap brace rivets...of course only those two inboard ones are smiled but they made it into the close-up.
Here's the wing tip support. Kind of kludgy, but it really doesn't actually support the wing...the wing is rigidly supported by the front spar at this point. This is just there to balance the fuselage until the other wing goes on.
Here's a treat for you builders out there...I took a few specific measurements to ease your mind. For me, I couldn't get a detailed enough answer from other builders on this one. Here are the exact height measurements in all the spots where you need 'em the most (keep in mind that my garage floor is NOT level, but these figures should get you within about 1/4" of where you need to be):
| Station | Above Ground | Above Belly at F-704 |
|---|---|---|
| Fuselage Belly at F-704 | 21 1/4" | 0" |
| Wing Inboard Supported | 21 1/2" | 1/4" |
| Wing Tip | 27 3/8" | 6 1/8" |
| Tail Cone at F-710 | 32 1/4" | 11" |
Here's the aileron pushrod where it comes in through the holes in the seat ribs. I'll wait to attach this until the other wing is on and I can climb on in. Could do it now, but I'll wait and do both simultaneously.
Jen had to go to work, but tomorrow I should be able to get the other wing on and finish up what I need to do (set incidence & sweep, rig the controls, set up the flap pushrods & their exit holes, plan some plumbing, etc.).