Author: farmerDan

We went till the very last minute with the full team before we got this picture. Cody spent the summer with us, partially working on the farm, and partially working on the airplane. Most days that meant the three of us working together, usually the two boys on one project, with me trying to figure something out or complete some random task. Our goal was to get the fuselage wrapped before Cody left and as you can see in the pic, we did so, with minutes to spare. We still need to apply the tapes and finish up the wrap but the hard part is done.

With Cody leaving, and Spork now starting school, we enter the more sedate phase of our build. Maybe working 1-2 days per week on the plane instead of 4-6. I will be working on it some during the off days, doing things like building out the avionics, figuring out the engine plumbing, things like that. Basically the head scratching or tedious parts. Then when Spork is available we’ll tackle things like finishing these needed tapes, painting the airplane, etc.

Speaking of painting, it is time to work on that. We started building the paint booth where the wings were previously being worked on. They were moved temporarily next door and covered with a tarp while the paint booth is under construction, which should be finished today. It is a basic PVC structure with plastic sheeting attached. It is tied to the wood structure of the barn to make it rigid but otherwise is just uncut PVC friction fit together. The idea is we will return all the undamaged PVC when we finish and we’ll end up with a very low cost paint booth.

We are building and installing a ventilation system which consists of some fans and house filters and a couple of wooden frames. But other than that it’ll be paint masks and Tyvek suits for painting. Simple.

But before we could do all this paint booth business, we had to get the wings out of there.

We were all feeling really good about our accomplishments. The fuselage was covered. The wings were done. It was time to build a paint booth. I got up the next morning after the group picture above and headed over to the shop by myself. I wanted to get prepped for building the paint booth.

When I looked at the completed wings, I noted that we had a couple of tapes that hadn’t been finished. Just little tag ends of the finish tapes as they terminate at the wingtip and root. Should take about 10 minutes to trim them and glue them down. It isn’t even critical because both will be hidden when the plane is assembled and the could have just been trimmed but I wanted it done right.

So rather than work on other stuff, I plopped down and started working on these last details. This involved moving the wing around a bit, something we normally have plenty of hands for. But this morning I was by myself. Without going into details of the actual stupidity, I managed to knock the wing off of the sawhorse one end was sitting on and barely catch it from the other end before it fell, trailing edge first, onto the concrete floor. Now I was in the shop, alone, with a wing that has several hundred hours of work in it and is 5 minutes from being complete, barely held up by an unstable sawhorse and my struggling mightily from the other end.

Eventually, after several intense minutes, I got the wing back stable and went ahead and had the heart attack that had been waiting to start.

Once my heart attack was over, I leaned over to inspect the bottom side of the wing. There was a huge gash in the fabric where the saw horse has punched through. It was inline with the direction of flight, in the last wing panel, and 12″ long.

At that point I just sat down in a chair and stared at the wing for about 10 minutes. No point doing anything rash and making things worse. I then did the following steps.

1. Berate myself for being stupid
2. Wonder how I was going to explain to Spork I’d messed up the wing that basically he and Cody had covered
3. Get out the Superflite manual and review the steps for repairing fabric
4. Watch about 3 videos from EAA on repairing fabric
5. Look up and read the FAA Advisory Circular on fabric repairs
6. Go visit my A&P to discuss the repair
7. Berate myself for being so stupid.
8. Suck it up and repair the darned thing

I did consider recovering the entire wing. Strongly. We’d probably have enough fabric, and if not I can order some more. The cost wasn’t really my concern. But the reason they used fabric on planes in WWII is because of how easily and effectively it can be repaired. That’s what I kept hearing in my head as I stared at the wing.

Plus the purpose of building this plane was to learn and have fun with my son. I’m not trying to win an award at Oshkosh. That doesn’t mean we aren’t building an awesome and correct in every way airplane but at the end of the day, this was cosmetic damage, not structural or even important. There wasn’t any actual aircraft damage, just a rip in some fabric that isn’t even painted yet. So with knowledge in hand, I set about repairing the fabric.

I got out the glue, a 6″ tape from what we’d used to cover the leading edge, glued the fabric around the tear very well, applied the tape, then once the glue had cured fully, I shrunk the tape. The loose fabric immediately taughtened and once again looked perfect. I then applied 2″ tapes on both sides of the 6″ tape.

The FAA rules say if the rip is 16″ or longer, I need to do some further repairs. This one was 12″ so this type of repair is correct.

The rules say if my Vne is above 150mph I need to do some further repairs. My Vne is nowhere close. I’m not sure a SuperSTOL could do 150 in a dive.

The rules say I’m supposed to have a 2″ overlap of the tear. I have 3″, along with 2″ of extra tape.

The repair is inline with the existing tapes and unless you compare it with the other wing, you don’t even see it. Once it is painted, you’ll never know it was there. And like most repairs, it is actually stronger now than the original fabric.

Despite all that, I’m still sick about the whole thing. But in the end, I learned that repairs in fabric really are easy. That gives me some confidence going forward that I know how to do more than just apply fabric. I can fix it too.

That doesn’t mean I’m looking to do any more repairs though.

The past several days have been slow going. We’ve had about 5 days of working on the airplane, but only 1/2 days or so so the equivalent of 2 1/2 days of work.

We covered the left wing, with plans to move onto the fuselage as quickly as possible. However we ran into some snags with the fuselage that held us up quite a bit. We eventually got it all handled, but not until a 3am work session finally got us over the hump.

But to get started, we had to get the left wing covered.

It was enjoyable to cover the left wing. Having already covered the right wing, I felt like we were getting the hang of things and we’d be able to make quick progress on this wing. Unfortunately we ended up with some wrinkles that I couldn’t get out of the wing. We had the choice of pulling off the covering and redoing it, or trying to make the best of what we had. The issues were 100% cosmetic so after much deliberation, we decided to forge ahead. Now that the wing is covered, I’m glad we stuck with it. The wrinkles won’t be noticed as they are very small, on top of the wing, and behind the slats. If you are looking that closely then I’m probably going to chase you with a broom anyway.

There aren’t any more pics of covering the left wing. It was just like the right wing. Nothing to see here. Move along.

Before we could cover the fuselage, we had to install the autopilot pitch servo and a VOR antennae. There were several trips to HRJ to get parts ordered from Scott, and pick up doo dads he had there in the shop. I’d originally thought I’d place the pitch servo under the pilots seat, and the roll servo under the co-pilots seat. However a post by my friends Ed and Michael showed where they had put their pitch servo and I liked it much better. Since imitation is the best form of flattery, I flattered their butts off but stealing their entire design. I even snuck over to their house to not only pilfer their design but to borrow some glue and tape. Am I a good friend or what?

In order to get the pitch servo located in its final position, I needed a push tube and some new hardware to connect it.

It was a real pleasure to have something to weld finally. I enjoy welding and I’ve barely done any so far on this airplane build.

With the push tube welded, I sand blasted the tube as well as the bracket for the pitch servo. I then shot a coat of epoxy primer on both. They looked really good and matched the existing frame very well. I was quite pleased with myself until I checked the range of motion. The pitch servo was traveling WAY too far. I checked what my friends had done and their looked exactly like mine. Why is mine traveling so far and their only far enough that it works correctly? No idea.

After some head scratching, I decided to fab up a solution that would move the attach point closer to the pivot point on the bell crank. Some aluminum, some sander time, and a few clamps and the servo was mounted perfectly.

A few checks of range of motion and everything looked perfect. Hopefully the servo will have enough torque to control the pitch with this short arm.

On one of my trips to the airport, I found out the battery had died on our Citabria. The battery was 5 years old so it is due for replacement anyway but leaving the master on accidentally had hastened its demise.  It was about $320 for a new battery, plus we had to put it in. However I had a new battery charger I’d purchased at a recommendation from EAA magazine. The writer said he was very impressed with the battery charger and that it had brought a dead battery back to life using its recondition mode. This sounded like a perfect opportunity to try it out.

Over time I was able to coax the battery slowly back to life. It took multiple cycles (like 5-6) of two different chargers to go from 0 volts and “bad battery” on the display until it finally started taking a charge. Once it would take a charge, I put it in recondition mode and was able to restore the battery to 13.2 volts. We installed it back into the Citabria and it worked like it had when we bought the airplane. Maybe not brand new, but certainly good enough for us to use. That 30 dollar battery charger saved us $300. I’m more than pleased. I asked Scott for a battery in even worse condition. I’m currently working on that one and have it back to about 12.5 volts.

I had to remake the tombstone panel in .040 aluminum. I then made stiffeners out of the old panel and riveted them in place. I then epoxied two bolts into the antennae so it could be tightened from the outside. It fit very well and looks perfect

With the autopilot servo in place, and the antennae mounted and wired, it was time to tidy up and get ready to cover. One big step was to check for any wires that might chafe. Above you can see little blogs of red clay. What this is is actually Sugru that we purchased from Amazon. This is my new favorite stuff. Moldable, hardenable, and easy to use. This stuff solved all my chafe issues.

With everything tidied up, it was time to start covering. 

We only got started on the covering as I had to go pick up a cow at the processor. However tomorrow we hope to make good progress on the covering of one side, and hopefully start on the other side of the fuselage. Then tapes and finish work and it is time to start painting! Cody leaves Sunday morning so hopefully we’ll have pics of a fuselage covered before he leaves.

This post marks the end of our summer build. Spork and I have worked pretty much every day we could, from the last day of May till yesterday. I’d say we averaged about 5.5 days per week working on the airplane. Usually from about 7am till about 5pm, with a break for lunch, a trip to Lowes, a trip to the airport, etc thrown in there. We missed a few weeks here and there, for a trip to Grenada, the kids going to the beach with mom, summer camp, and things like that. All in we got about 6.5 weeks of work this summer. We also had cousin Cody over for a couple of weeks this summer.

If I add up all the hours we’ve spent this summer, it comes up to over 700 hours of time spent. Since we already had a few hundred hours under our belt from our time at Robby’s, we should be just about done with the airplane. Maybe 100 hours to go towards our 1000 hour build time. Apparently we are slow because we still have some covering left to do. Paint. Wiring. Hang the engine. Avionics. Rigging. I’d say we have 500 hours left but maybe it’ll go faster than I think.

Today, school starts. We will be dropping back from 5.5 days per week, 10-12 hours per day, to 2-3 days per week, 4 hours per day. If we can maintain the new pace and not hit any snags, we should be finishing up the airplane by late fall. That would suit me perfectly as it would give nice fall weather for test flights and all winter to work out the bugs before trying to make our planned trip to Sun N Fun 2019 in April. We’ll see. For now, what have we gotten done?

Step one was to prep the fuselage for covering. We aren’t done with the left wing yet, but until the new magnetometer showed up, we couldn’t do any more work on the wing. All the work on this airplane has been done in our barn. We’ve worked hard to keep things clean and less barny but no matter what we do, we still have to deal with flies getting in on occasion. Both Spork and I are kinda crazy about stopping and killing any fly that we see, and the picture above is why. The flies land on the fuselage, and then poop. They leave little black dots everywhere. We spent a solid hour just wiping the fuselage down with acetone, cleaning everything off. That was a good time to inspect every last little corner as well since after this part was done, the fuselage would be no longer accessible. We found a few places that needed to be repaired, mostly on the tail but one on in the cockpit as well.

This place was on the co-pilot side of the airplane, at the rear of the cockpit. Somewhere along the way the powder coat had been scratched and rust was starting to appear. Spork caught this one and I sat about getting it ready to repair.

There is a lot of masking off just to paint a little spot.

I mixed up some epoxy based primer, the same stuff I used on the spoilers when I painted them. It is grey, but not the same grey as the fuselage. It should be close enough though since it will all be covered anyway.

Since we were painting anyway, it was time to primer the baggage door. It is just raw aluminum stock so it can use all the help it can get. Again it was a large masking job for a small amount of painting.

The final bit of painting was to paint the bottom of the tail. This is where the plane has been either sitting on the trailer or attached to the tail stand. There were numerous small places that needed to be sanded, etched, and painted. Now all the fuselage was covered in either grey powder coat or grey epoxy primer. Nowhere for rust to get started on this thing.

There was a tip in this past month’s EAA magazine for a product called Sugru. It is a moldable putty like Play-Do but after setting it overnight, it turns into a glue/silicon thing. Soft but solid, heat and cold resistant. It is really a household repair thing but according to the EAA author it works excellent for airplanes. I already had an area in mind that needed some attention and that was the fuel line coming from the fuel selector and towards the firewall. There is a bend as the rubber hose makes the transition and I could see where over time it compresses the bend and kinks at some point, which is bad. With Sugru I was able to attach the line to the frame and hold it in position so it won’t kink, without having to use a zip tie which has its own issues. Pretty good stuff.

If I thought the wings were a big covering job, the fuselage is a whole new level. Several feet longer, with lots of places to cut around, get fitted, etc. There is a lot less glue to spread so that parts goes quicker. We had an issue with some big wrinkles on the left wing so we took extra time getting this fabric on just right before starting any attachments or cutting. Once everything was looking good, we trimmed off the excess and did an initial shrink to tighten the fabric. It came out perfectly!

It is exciting to see the covering going onto the airplane. To the layman, the airplane looks exactly like it did when we picked it up. A grey structure of tubes.

They don’t see all the work of all the fiddly bits that we’ve installed over these hundreds of hours. But when the fabric goes on, it suddenly starts to look like an airplane. Plus when the covering is complete, that will mean that paint is next and then it will really start to look like an airplane. I’m excited for that part to be done.

I think the part I’m most excited for is having the airplane on its landing gear finally. The stands are awesome for working, but until the fuselage is rolling around on its own tires it just doesn’t seem like a real airplane. Plus a fellow EAA member had some extra tires he gave me a deal on (Hi Brian!) so once initial testing is over, I can take off my normal airplane tires and install these 26″ Alaska Bushwheels. Then the plane will look like a proper plane.

So Spork is at the beach having fun while I’m here slaving away. Since I’d finished the right wing covering, I texted SWMBO to tell him I’d gotten it done. That way he’d know he didn’t have it waiting on him when he got back and to also let him know I was busy working while he was having fun. It was also to brag a little bit that I’d gotten everything done. The immediate reply?

Did you get the fuel tank installed?

Well, no. I’d gone to the house and had dinner instead. So much for bragging.

To install the fuel tank involves a bit of scary work. The tank slips inside a spot made just for it easy enough. But then you have to drill through the end rib of the airplane with three different holes. These holes are somewhat blind as the bottom side of the tank, where two of the holes are to be located, isn’t really accessible. And each hole has to line up perfectly with the corresponding place on the tank where different fittings are screwed in. The instructions, such as helpful instructions are, said “Measure and drill holes. Install fittings.” Um, ok. Thanks for the detailed explanation. Heck, it didn’t even say which fittings to install. Luckily I already knew but I verified with Robby just to make sure.

Before I could drill these holes for the fittings, I had to make sure the tank was installed and wouldn’t move. No sense making the holes align perfectly, only to find the tank had slipped while I was working. Scott had already coached me that rivnuts would be a better solution than rivets and had ordered some in for me to try. I’d never installed a rivnut but it seemed simple enough. Drill a hole, insert a rivnut, squeeze it with Scott’s special tool I had to borrow, then wash, rinse, repeat 15 more times.

After working with rivnuts for about 5 minutes, I decided they were the best thing ever. Very simple to install, and now the tank is held down by 8-32 screws instead of rivets that would have to be drilled out to remove the tank.

Here you can see the rivnuts holding the tank in place. This made it very easy to align the tank, and to install and remove it as I worked with the various fittings, tapping, cleaning out chips, etc. Definitely the way to go.

The plans only called for two rivets per side on the tank. I installed four rivnuts per side instead. I don’t think it will be going anywhere.

Now it was time to drill the holes in the end rib. Since I can measure three times and get six different measurements, I wasn’t too keen on measuring to match up these drilled holes as the plans suggest. Instead I grabbed a really small drill bit and guessed about where to drill. I closed my eyes and drilled the first hole through the rib. When I peeked through the hole in the rib, I was about 1/8″ off. Pull back, drill the hole in the new spot. Perfect! With the hole in the rib in the right spot, I simply pressed forward and pecked the boss in the fuel tank making a little dimple to mark where the fitting will be drilled and tapped once the tank is pulled.

I then swapped to a step drill and drilled out the final hole in the rib. In enlarging the hole, I took out the original wrong drill hole so no problem there as my mistake hole ended up on the ground as just some more chips.

I did the process times three. Two holes for the sight gauges, and one for the fuel pickup line.

I then pulled the fuel tank and drilled out the holes I’d marked to the correct size for a 1/8-27 NPT fitting, then tapped them. Then it was a simple process of flushing all the chips out of the tank and then putting the tank back in place.

Here the sight gauges are in place, as well as the fuel pickup. The front port was plugged, per the manual since I’m using a Rotax engine. I guess a Lycoming must have a fuel return line that would go there.

With the fuel tank installed, I moved the right wing up against the wall as close as I could, and then covered it in a tarp to protect it from dirt and the fabric from sunlight. I then dragged the left wing over to the center of the bay and say down on a chair and stared at it a while. We’d spent weeks on the right wing. Would it take weeks to work on the left wing as well? Hopefully we’d be faster now that everything was basically the same.

I started by removing the left wing slats from when we’d mated the wings to the fuselage. That took a bit of doing as a bolt had jammed behind some sheet metal and damaged the sheet metal. There was nothing to do but to cut it out and move forward, which is what I did. It isn’t a critical area and it will be behind the slats so not really visible. With the slats removed, I could either start prepping for covering, or I could work on the fuel tank. Since I had all the parts laying right there, I decided to work on the fuel tank. It took about 2.5 days to get the compression tubes installed and shimmed, the tank installed, the fittings installed, etc on the right wing. Plus I had Spork and Cody here to help me. Now I was by myself. I flipped the wing over, started on the compression tubes, and before I knew it was at this point.

It took me about four hours from drag the wing out to done. 1/2 day vs 2.5 days, and that 2.5 doesn’t include the trips to the airport to ask Scott questions or borrow tools, or texts to Robby, or trips to the store. That 2.5 days actually took about a week. Yeah, maybe this wing will go a bit faster.

So this is where we are today. I can only cover one side of the wing. The magnetometer from GRT was DOA when it arrived so I need a new one before I can close the wing up. I lost most of last week because GRT shut down for Oshkosh. Today is Tuesday and I don’t have high hopes I’ll get a call back today from GRT despite my email and phone messages asking for help. (Can you tell I’m getting pissed?) Today I’m doing some farming stuff, then working on the plane this afternoon. I have some new zip ties coming from Amazon today which I want to use to secure all the runs in the fuselage instead of the plain plastic ties I used already. So when they show, I’ll cut off the old and install the new. Once that is done, I have the choice of starting to cover the fuselage, or starting to work on the panel. I’ll be stopping by Hudson’s today to grab some lexan to start on the panel anyway and panel work is a lot of head scratching so I’m leaning towards that. Once GRT calls me, I’m going to get them to quick ship the parts I need and then hopefully I’ll have the boys here to start working on covering the wing.

Once the left wing is covered, we can start on the paint booth and covering the fuselage. Then it is on to painting. After painting, the gear goes on and it is time to make airplane noises. Vroom vroom!

 

We’ve not had a lot of updates to the blog lately. There are a few reasons for that. One, we are covering the wing.

And covering the wing.

And covering the wing.

There is only so much to say about that.

I was told that after we’d covered one wing, we’d have the hang of it. I was doubtful but I have to say after covering one wing, I think I may have the hang of it. We made a few little mistakes here and there, but overall the wing came out better than I would have expected. More importantly, I’m at the point where I feel like I can make a mistake and fix it. Not as in strip off all the fabric and start over from scratch fix it, but just fix the wrinkle, bubble, etc, and move on like it was never there. What is that saying? A professional knows how to hide his mistakes? Something like that.

We had a brief interlude in the airplane build this month. The Spohns and our family both took a vacation along with Grandma, who was the ring leader, to Grenada and St. Vincent and the Grenadines. It was an epic week and a chance for me to sail the Southern windward islands, which I’ve never done. We had a great crew and everyone had a large time.

After being gone for a week, it was tough to get back in the groove. Between all the to dos waiting when you get home and being out of the habit of working on the boat (and working period) it took most of the next week to finally get back in the shop.

While I was gone, the avionics from GRT Avionics showed up. Dustin grabbed them for me and put them in the shop. I eagerly opened the box of goodies to see what had shown up. Sadly, I was a bit disappointed. The EFIS looks perfect. But the engine monitor was for a Lycoming, not a Rotax, which is what I ordered. Also the autopilot servos showed up, but no mounting kits or hardware. Apparently I was supposed to know I had to order them separately. The last straw was when I went to install the magnetometer. This needs to be installed in the wing so we can cover the left wing next week. I noticed a rattle coming from inside. I opened to case to find that two of the elements of the circuit board were never attached to the board. They are wired, but not physically attached and secured making the magnetometer useless as it will break probably by the second flight. I emailed and called GRT, with no response and no way to get a person on the phone. Eventually I did receive a call back from a very nice guy who informed me that my magnetometer would need to come back to them and that they shut the company down for the week, for Oshkosh. So next week, sometime, I should be able to get it handled. Argh!! I have a wing I need to cover and I’m losing two weeks, plus shipping, for one stupid magnetometer.

Who shuts down an entire company and doesn’t put a notice on the website or on the answering machine? I was very excited to use GRT. So far, I’m less than impressed.

Before I knew the magnetometer was bad, I made up an install plate for it out of .020 aluminum. I needed to span the lightening holes in the rib. I also planned on putting the magnetometer inboard on the wing rather than on the wingtip as recommended. The strobes are going to be installed out on the wingtip and I was worried about the pulses of electricity messing with the very sensitive magnetometer. By installing it in this location, I was able to run the wires back to the fuselage tied to the pitot tube which was already carefully run through grommets with some extra room.

By this point I knew the unit was bad, but I got it installed anyway as I was stuck on anything else to do.

While I was sorting out electronics and warranty returns, Spork was steadily working on the wing. During out work, we noticed a small blemish in the fabric on the top of the wing. We’ve been very careful around the wing so I can only assume this was a factory defect that appeared when we tightened the fabric. Regardless, it needed a patch as the entire wing was covered at this point. I researched in the SuperFlite manual, and online, and couldn’t find any decent information on making a patch. I knew it was basically a doily like we would use on the inspection rings, but what I couldn’t find was if I should shrink the fabric after installing it. The purpose of the patch is to cover a hole. But the base fabric is already shrunk. So do I attach this patch, then shrink it too? Would that cause a pucker in the base fabric? If I don’t shrink it, then the patch isn’t really taking any load.

Finally I reached out to Scott who assured me, yes, shrink the patch but only to the first temp (250 degrees). Patch installed we went back to work.

Spork is very meticulous when he works on the covering, which I appreciate. While he was working, he noted that one rivet was not covered by any of our finish tapes. Something we’d all missed up to this point. With our patching experience firmly in hand, Spork cut out a quick doily and made a one piece finishing tape for this lone rivet. This one did not need to be shrunk like the patch job required.

While Spork was working on the wing, I set about working on the fuel system. I’d had Scott order some hose for fuel lines prior to ordering the firewall forward kit. I didn’t even think about the kit having its own fuel lines, but of course it did.

Regardless, I’d already run the Aircraft Spruce supplied fuel line through the fuselage so I just stuck with that one. Except when it came time to install everything, I couldn’t get the fuel line to go onto the barbed fittings. It was REALLY tight. I looked at the ID of the lines, and the one I was using actually looked a bit bigger than the kit supplied fuel line so it should work. I tried again. I cursed, I went to EAA tech tips, I went to YouTube. Finally I called Scott and asked him why I couldn’t get the fuel line on He couldn’t answer, but he said he’d drive up during his lunch hour and look for me. I was floored. I didn’t expect a house call from an A&P. I’m always surprised that he even answers my phone calls. But during the conversation with him, it occurred to me that maybe I should try the kit supplied fuel line, even though it appears smaller.

Turns out, the fuel line that comes with the kit is a much more supple line, with less reinforcing. It slipped on like butter. I’d spent the morning nearly breaking things trying to force the wrong line onto the fittings. Once the new line was installed, it took about 10 minutes to do the entire job. Duh.

With the header tank plumbed, I went back and with a combination of Adel clamps and zip ties, secured the fuel line and the return line in place. The lines are just hanging off the front at the firewall waiting for the engine install.

Before I left for Grenada, I ordered the Rotax 912 engine that we are going to be using. It will most likely sit in the crate for several months, but at least it will be on hand and ready to install should we make progress on the build.

One of my original goals with this airplane was that it would be powered by a Rotax. I wanted to fly behind a modern aircraft engine, with proper ignition, no mixture, and the ability to operate off of automobile gasoline, or MOGAS as it is called in aviation. This lets me get gas from my normal source and keep it here at the farm vs having to find 100LL aviation fuel and get it here for twice the price.

The last piece of the puzzle, besides the many hours of labor it will take to build this airplane, is the propeller. I have one coming from Robby as well that will surely be hanging on the wall well into this winter. But when that arrives, all the major pieces of the puzzle are on site. Now it is just up to Spork and I to assemble everything.

While I was working on all the bits and bobs, Spork had been making progress on the wing. I came back over to go over the last bit of finish taping and helped him finish. Then it was time to move onto the inspection rings. As with most elements of this build, there was some trepidation over doing this for the first time. What if I put them in the wrong place? What if they don’t stick? As usual, reality turned out to be far less scary than imagination. We had the other wing sitting directly beside this one, completely uncovered. Spork and I spent some time making sure all the rings were in the correct spots, then we marked them and started cutting out doilies.

Eventually Spork took off to the beach for the last summer vacation before school starts and Crystal and I worked on the inspection rings. Scuff the rings, glue the base of the fabric, glue the rings, wet the base glue, stick the ring in place, then cover with a doily. Move onto the next ring. It took about two hours to install them all.

The tapes are all in place. The trim work is done, all the little bubbles and wrinkles have been addressed, and the inspection rings are installed. This wing is covered!

Today I’ll install the fuel tank, then move this wing over to the side and carefully cover it to protect it from light and from getting damaged. Hopefully the left wing will go much faster since we now have some experience doing this. We can’t get too far ahead of ourselves, because I have to wait till the magnetometer shows up to cover the left wing. But I can at least cover one side of it. Plus there is a ton of prep that has to be done to the wing itself. Scotch brite, cleaning, etc. Luckily Spork and Cody will be here soon so they can get to work on that portion while I go to work on the panel and the autopilot servo install.

Once the left wing is covered, it will be time to build the paint booth. While that is being build, we should be covering the fuselage. Once it is covered, it will be time for paint. Once paint is done, we can mount the fuselage on the landing gear and finally have a rolling chassis which means sitting in the seats and making airplane noises!

 

We have a stomach bug going around the house. It started with Cody, then progressed to The Princess, and then today it hit Spork who was down for the count for the day, never getting out of bed or very far away from a throw up container. Poor guy.

The weather was epic so we enjoyed a cool day in the shop with a nice breeze provided by the fans. The fabric was already on, but the tapes needed to be done. But before that, the tail wheel shock needed to be finished, which meant fitting the access panel we made to the shock dimensions. Cody knocked that out in no time and we moved onto taping.

As we progress to each portion of the build, I always worry what the next part will be like. Will taping be really hard? What about hanging the engine? What if I mess that up? Or the wiring for the avionics? What if I let the smoke out and ruin the avionics. There is always a little trepidation at each new step that I will come up short on knowledge or talent. Taping was, oddly, one that I was worried about. But with Cody’s help, we got started and found that it was, as promised, decidedly easy. It is tedious, but really it is just an arts and craft project. Lay out some lines, spread some glue, lay out the tape, spread some thinner glue, move on to the next part. It is actually quite enjoyable and begins to make the wing look like an airplane wing.

Of course, the next step is inspection rings. And I’m already worried about them. Even though I’ve already done one once before at an EAA workshop. It has been several years. Plus, what if I put them in the wrong place?!

We’ll get there, and get it done somehow.

Wednesday is our next work day. Hopefully we’ll have everyone healthy and be able to work. We need to flip the wing and tape the other side. Then we’ll tape the edges and the wing will be covered! Then we’ll use the uncovered wing to locate where our inspection holes should be and cut in the holes (scary!) Once the inspection holes are in, we’ll move this wing to another shop bay and start on the next wing. Hopefully we can get this wing done in a much shorter time frame since we now have some experience. I’d like to at least get it wrapped by Friday if possible, maybe even a tape or two in place.

Once the second wing is done, which will probably take about a week, we can move onto covering the fuselage. We are doing that last because I am waiting on avionics to show up and I need to install autopilot servos before covering. There is no provision for an autopilot in the SuperSTOL build so we’ll have to make it up as we go. Should be interesting.

Based on the blog, you’d think we haven’t been working on the plane. Quite the opposite is true. We’ve been working nearly every day, with little time left over for documenting the build. When we last left off, Spork had completed the battery box and installed it.

We added a simple 24 gauge cable to provide for a battery condition monitor LED, a feature of the EarthX battery. The problem was we didn’t have the correct connector, despite ordering an entire set of connectors for airplane builders. We had every connector in the world, except the one we needed. Luckily Scott bailed us out, again, and got us the connector we needed. Here you see the cable, with a service loop installed.

Since we had the correct connectors, and we had our new label maker, we also ran the ELT cable for the cockpit remote switch. We labeled the cable so that when the time comes,  we won’t be wondering which white cable this is.

We had a lot of false starts on covering our first wing. We had to install the compression tubes for the fuel tank, we had to paint the spoilers three our four times, I lost count, and we had a number of parts we had to go get or special order in. We lost several days due to these issues.

I fretted over whether to sandblast the spoilers for a few days. Luckily I decided to do so because we ended up sand blasting off our paint several times and starting over. We started with an automotive style rattle can primer and paint. When that proved to be too fragile we went to an epoxy based primer, PPG brand from Single Source here in town. While I was at it, I painted the locking collars from the tailwheel, the little circles you see beside the spoilers.

We also used the belt sander to break the corners of the spoilers and the edges. Corners and edges are the first places to loose paint and these things will be sticking up into the wind quite a bit so I wanted to make sure the paint stayed in place. Rounded edges will help quite a bit.

With the compression tubes nearly installed, we came across a problem. We didn’t have a simple little bracket that is installed on the hardware for the fuel tank and holds the flap return spring. We also didn’t have the bolts that held the bracket. I called Amy at Just Aircraft and she had the needed hardware going out the same day, along with a firewall forward kit I’d ordered a few days before from Billy at Plane Fun Aircraft. Everything showed up literally minutes before we ran out of parts and had to stop work. With hardware in hand, we were able to install the flap return spring, the compression tubes, and temporarily mount the fuel tank. Everything went in just like it should, at least after we thinned out some of the shim washers for the fuel tank.

Once the compression tubes were in the wings I checked with Robby to see how he mounts them. “Some people use screws but I just rivet them in place. They are easy to drill out.”

I liked the idea of riveting them, but looking at the needed dimensions I saw that the CCP-44 rivets were not going to work. In desperation, I went to visit Scott to see what he thought I should do. “Rivnuts” was his answer. We ordered some, along with screws, to be delivered this coming week. With rivnuts in hand, we’ll install them and then install the tanks. These are an even better solution than rivets as we will have simple screws to remove the tank should we need to at some point in the future.

As I said, we had several in and outs with the spoilers but it was ok. I needed some practice painting and the spoilers were a good item to practice on. A small mistake could be sand blasted off in a few minutes and the could be repainted with a small amount of materials.

With the several setbacks behind us, we finally started covering the wing. About this time, we had a stomach bug start working its way through the house putting both Cody and Spork on their butts. I spent an entire day working by myself on Saturday and made good progress on the wing.

When the fabric is installed, we burn holes through the ribs in spots pre-drilled. These allow us to install large headed rivets for holding the fabric in place. This is fun because it is so easy, and terrifying because one wrong move and you burn a hole through your fabric. Scary!

While we were doing all this work, our paint showed up for the airplane. These few cans of paint is what $3000 worth of paint looks like. Good thing I’m a master painter and won’t make any mistakes. Yeah right.

This is a bit of a disjointed update. Lots was done but it was all given short shrift in this multi day post. We’ve been going from can to can’t these past few weeks, trying to get as much done on the plane as possible, while still maintaining a farm, having two renters move out the same month, and still doing work at the Civil Air Patrol. It has been fun. Our status today is the right wing is covered, minus the final heat shrink and tapes. Once those tapes are done, we’ll move the wing to the next bay over and cover it to protect it from the sun. Then we’ll start on the left wing and wash, rinse, repeat. Once the left wing is done, hopefully this week, we’ll move that wing out and we’ll have room for the paint booth to be built while we start covering the fuselage. When everything is covered, it will be time to paint, sand, paint, sand, etc.

Once the painting is over, we’ll bring all the pieces together and remount the wings and take the fuselage off the stands for good, putting the plane on its gear. With wings and gear, we’ll hang the engine which should be here by then, and then it is time for the avionics.

Then it is time for final assembly! That will probably take two months but whatever, it is something to dream about.

Hopefully our perennial pet, Mr. Frog, will still be around by then so he can see our creation come to life.

 

Today was the day of the Spork. Almost all of our projects for the day revolved around finishing the battery box. I did small things around the shop and a few small things to the airplane such as tidying up the ELT antennae.

I had some surgical tubing hanging around the shop from a sling shot project we’d done years ago. It is soft rubber that combined with a zip tie gives a good vibration friendly hold of the top of the antennae keeping it from whacking into things in the tail during flight.

I also added a small contribution to the battery box by milling the slot in the tray for the hold down straps. Not because Spork couldn’t do it but it was a good division of labor at the moment so I knocked it out.

But other than milling the slot and a sometimes helpful bit of advice here or there, this battery box was entirely Spork’s creation, from concept to template to fruition. He even did all the installation in the airplane. And it fit perfectly! Just the right amount of hold down tension, perfect brakes on the metal. It looks really good and he learned a lot.

You don’t really notice it there, but the ground cable is complete and laying against the bulkhead. The hot lead is hooked up to the battery and the ground is bolted to the airframe but not connected to the battery, keeping the angry pixies from flowing and creating any sparks.

The weight savings for this battery vs. a normal battery is amazing. I have pretty much the same battery in a traditional lead acid battery and it weighs probably 30 pounds. This one weighs about 3-4 pounds? When you pick it up, it feels like an inert sample battery like you’d see on display. The shell is there, but none of the guts. It is kinda weird.  And it has slightly more amperage and higher voltage than the other battery I have on hand. It does cost about 4 times as much, so there is that, but when every pound counts, this is a huge weight savings. It also means we could make the battery box out of lighter material as well, saving weight there as well as work since thinner metal is easier to work.

With the battery installed, we could proceed onto other battery related items like running the power cable to the front of the airplane. This was a simple run as the wings have been removed and the fuselage is back on the rotating stands in prep for covering. So it was a simple matter of running the cable to the front, measuring the length we needed, and cutting off the extra (which became the ground lead). Then I taped the last terminal to the end of the cable so when it is time to start working in the cockpit, we will mount the master relay, then terminate this battery cable and attach. Voila! Instant power to the cockpit.

While I was snapping pictures, I realized that I really didn’t have a good picture of the cargo door we made once everything was finalized. Here you can see the frame within a frame that we made, plus the holes drilled for the hinge and for the drip guard. The bottom looks a bit green because it is. I had to file down a bit of the metal to get the Hysol filed smooth. So that is primer to protect the exposed metal. Once I get the painting equipment setup, I’ll go back and primer the entire door frame as there are nicks and bumps here and there from our work. This will be an area that gets banged a lot so it will need some extra protection.

Technically this is the to do list from the 23rd. That is the day we called an audible and did the butt ribs instead.

With the box completed and installed, we knocked out making and running the cables. I also adjusted the tailwheel lock so it works much better now.

Today I’m supposed to receive a box of aviation grade electrical terminals. Those should allow me to install the battery condition cable which basically blinks a light on the panel to alert you to the battery state. I’ll also be able to install the ELT cable as there are some terminals I need for that. Once those cables are installed and everything zip tied in place, it will be a once over of the fuselage to inspect for any dinged powder coat and a thorough cleaning. With everything touched up and clean, the fuselage will officially be ready for covering. I guess I should enjoy this to do list because the next one will say “cover airplane” and be the same for about a month. Not really, but close enough.

We’ll actually cover the wings first, because we need them done and out of the way so the paint booth can be constructed. I should pick up some box fans for that as well, now that I think about it. Done, gotta love Amazon. With the wings covered, we can then go to work on the covering the fuselage. Once that is done then it is time to start painting, something I know very little about. Oh well, this is supposed to be a learning experience. I’m sure it will be.

 

Each morning I try to take the supplies we have, the supplies we need, the instructions I’ve read, the parts that are ready to install, and the page of the manual I happen to be on at the moment and condense it down into a to do list for the day. We never get the entire to do list done in a day. That isn’t the point. The point is we both, or if Cody is here, all three of us know what is on the agenda and if you don’t know what you are doing, then refer to the list.

Today when we got up, it was battery day. Finish the battery tray. Make up the cables. Install the battery tray, etc, etc. The battery had been all over the to do list for the past several days, so today was our day to get it finished.

Spork had been working on the battery tray for several days off and on and today was the day to start braking metal. 

As with most plans, the template didn’t exactly fit in the brake so there were a few last minute adjustments.

With the tray itself made, we were discussing making the straps that will secure the battery into the tray when a combination of events and available personnel allowed us to call an audible. We bagged the battery tray and instead elected to work on the butt ribs. Getting the butt ribs done would put us back to plan A, which meant getting the wings off the airplane and onto the stands for covering. This would allow us have much better access to the fuselage for the rest of the work we were doing to the battery and other things like the ELT. It would also allow us to split our duties, with someone beginning to work on the wings.

With all hands on deck, including the girls in the store, we switched gears and did a mad dash to get all the butt rib work done prior to rolling the airplane outside. That included taking a couple of read throughs through the instructions on how to do it. Once everything was ready, we took the airplane outside and unfolded the wings.

It is amazing how simple something goes when you have lots of help and all the prep work has been done. It took us about two hours to go from rolling the airplane outside to rolling it back inside with the ribs fully installed. We had not one mistake and everything went relatively smoothly.

Once the butt ribs were squared away, we removed the wings and put them on the stands. We then rolled the airplane back inside and shut the door. It was beginning to get a bit hot by this point so there was a celebratory watermelon cut open (thanks Miguel!) and everyone got a few pieces.

We needed to go swap some battery terminals out for the correct ones, and we needed some odds and ends from the hardware store. By this time it was 2pm, hot, and we’d been at it since 6am. We decided to spend the afternoon running errands and cleaning up and getting ready for church instead of working on the battery.

It was a relatively short day, but I’d planned on getting the butt ribs done on Monday so technically we are a couple of days ahead of schedule. We should be able to knock out the rest of the to do list tomorrow and be onto covering starting on Monday. That is at least one day ahead of plan, possibly two.

Technically we only crossed two things off the list today. Install magnetic catch on the shop door and install butt ribs. But in reality we’ve nearly finished the battery tray and the rest of those battery related items should go quickly. We picked up a battery terminal crimper yesterday at Agri Supply so making the cables should go easy enough.

I also found out that we don’t need to run the wingtip lights now and we can wait till after covering and painting so that item will get moved off the list. Also the gauge for the LED light has been determined. It is 24 gauge which I already have on hand.

My terminal kit should be here Monday so I can hook up the LED light cable, zip tie everything together, and put the tail of the fuselage back onto a rotating stand. At that point, we are ready to start covering. While I’m waiting on the terminal kit to arrive, we can start prepping the wings so Monday should be a busy day.

Messing up, especially for a type A, pilot type, is devastating. All you can hope is that no one noticed. Unfortunately (actually fortunately) I have Spork (and in this case Cody) alongside to see me mess up. But at least they are family so we’ll keep it quiet.

Except trying to be an example to Spork in my blog post timeliness, I’ve also blogged pretty much every day on the build. Yes I’m supposed to blog every day, but I don’t always do it the same day or the next day. There is some time between the action and the post so I have time to learn a bit and maybe edit out the worst of my mistakes. But in this case, I blogged the same day, documenting for to the world my mess up. Yesterday it all came to light.

I’d blogged previously about trying to install the butt ribs, and what a pain in the butt that turned out to be. The root cause of that failure was that I thought we were simply taping the slats in place, not actually installing the slats. So we’d pulled the airplane outside, on a day forecast to reach 100 degrees, with the idea that we’d tape the slats in place, knock out the butt ribs, and be back inside before it got hot.

When I found out that we actually had to install the slats, not just tape them in place, I didn’t want to take the time to go find the section of the manual that explained how to install the slats. I figured it was just temporary anyway, I can get them in quickly. Plus the slat section was buried in the wing build section. Since I didn’t build the wing, I really don’t know my way around that section as well. Time was a wasting and I had two boys standing there ready to work. I didn’t want to spent the next 30 minutes reading. So we went straight to work.

Then the bolts didn’t easily fit into the bearings that hold the control arms on the slats. Hmm, odd. But having to press a bolt/pin into a bearing is normal. You want the bearing to spin, not the bearing on the bolt itself, that causes wear and eventually failure. So we pressed in the bolts which was a pain and later caused me to use a slide hammer to remove one. Finding out the slats were labeled wrong was simply the icing on the cake the caused the entire day to go sideways.

So yesterday I sit down before work begins and open the manual. Lets see what it says about installing slats….

I’ll save you the squinting. Sentence two says, “The AN 3-20 bolts will have to have the cad plating removed to fit into the bearings properly, the head of the bolt should bottom out on the bearing without putting any pressure on it.”

Sigh

It never occurred to me to remove the protective cad plating, since its, um, protective. I took a small set of bolts, pressed the bearings back off with the hydraulic press, and took them to the belt grinder where I Scotch brited off the cad plating. They fit better. I worked them a bit more, the bearing slid on smoothly but didn’t seat on the head as described in the instructions. I moved to the small belt sander and a fine belt, touching up the area around the head. Butter.

Now I could install the slats with relative ease, inserting and removing the bolts as needed. With now proper hardware, I installed the slat I’d relabeled the day before and prepared to move forward. Except it was the wrong side! How could that be?!

I didn’t have the slats labeled wrong, I had the sets wrong. I thought we had inboard and outboard as sets, No, we had left, and right as sets. Which meant that the label I’d so carefully checked to make sure was wrong, was actually correct. Those were the left wing slats, inboard and outboard. I’d just installed one on the right wing.

Sigh

All of this had been for nothing, because I was in a hurry to beat the heat.

So, after much swapping around and grousing, I installed, along with the help of Spork, both inboard slat sections, and taped them in place. I then made sure to label the outboard slats and put them away. What has taken two days should take about an hour next time. Lesson learned, it’s better to stop and understand what you are doing rather than press on (pun intended).

Had we beaten the heat that day, we’d have pulled the wings off and put them back on their rotating stands. Now we have to work around the wings in place. Spork came up with the idea to spread them partially like in the picture. We bubble wrapped the wing tips and tied off the wings to each side so we have access to the fuselage. It is much better than working around the wings in their stowed position. Good call Spork!

After checking with Scott to verify that this antennae does indeed ned to be grounded, I switched up my plan and went back to the method suggested in the manual for this antennae. My concern was the tip of the antennae is going to rub the fabric or bang against the fuselage members, but with some careful planning I was able to get it to fit very well and not bother anything. I hope.

Spork spent the day, and I mean the entire day, working on a battery box. I’d forgotten to order one, so no problem. We’ll just make it!

Making a template and then transferring it to metal is a new skill for him. He worked very diligently and very hard. He also was not accepting of any errors or mistakes. The end result is after nearly a full days work, he is still making the template and hasn’t cut the first piece of metal yet. He’s getting close, but by about 3:30pm (we started at 6am) I could see he was wearing out on this one job.

We took some time yesterday to run some errands and do non-building stuff. We went to Angie’s for lunch, stopped by Loop Road Auto Parts and Lowes to get some supplies and even stopped and picked up some salt for the pool. By the afternoon we were both wearing out a bit. I sent Spork home to unload the 600 lbs of salt from the truck and then to work on his blog post in the A/C. I went upstairs and turned on the A/C myself in order to work on the ELT plug wiring. I spent about 2 hours going over the schematic, getting my work area ready, and then soldering. The end result?

This was tedious work. The connectors are VERY small, so small I have trouble seeing them. But I think I was able to get them wired correctly and the heat shrink all looks good. A little finish work and this connector will be closed up and plugged into the ELT so we can run the wire to the cockpit. Another task to complete before covering. 

So despite the setbacks the past few days, we are actually making good progress. Many of the items on this list revolve around getting the battery box made and the battery wiring installed. You can see Cody written by a number of the items on the list. Those are things we are waiting for Cody to come back for, although if we make enough progress we may coerce Miguel to help us and then we’ll tackle the butt ribs ourselves on one of these cooler days coming up. We have about 5-6 work days before Cody shows back up, so yeah, we’ll need to get the butt ribs installed before he gets here, and then remove the wings and get them prepped for covering.

I also want to look at what it would take to make a bike mount for the wings.

A bush plane, that lands pretty much anywhere, with a couple of mountain bikes slung underneath, makes for a pretty useful critter. Even if all you are doing is going to a fly in. Word is it only costs a couple MPH and they ride under there deceptively well. We’ll see. Up to this point, I’ve not wanted to make any changes to the kit. And I probably won’t now, but I’d at least like to investigate what it would take to do the work before I cover the wings. That will go on today’s list.