Wing ribs
Had a little time tonight to work on wing ribs. I got the airfoil routed on the remaining five. I still have to route the lightening holes after cutting out most of the unneeded ply. They are coming out consistent and look good. The rib on the right is the original used to make the routing template. The template is second from the right. The first fully cut rib is in the middle with the ribs cut tonight to the left. The black marker is just a guide for roughing out the holes before doing the final cut with the router.
I'm using a Bosch laminate trimmer, which is much easier to handle for small jobs than my full-size router.
First rudder rib done.
I didn't have much time to work today, but I managed to get the top rib on the rudder made and welded. The .025 steel was much easier to use than the .032 I tried earlier. I had the .032 on hand and figured it would be ok, but it was a pain to bend in my cheap little benchtop brake. The .025 (as callled out in the stock plans) worked great. I should be able to install the other two ribs on Sunday.
I tried a trial fit of the new tailwheel on the new spring. It fits fine, but is raked forward about 5 degrees. It's not clear is this will improve when with the engine, wings and other mounted. I will have to think about this a bit before deciding what to do. I'm using the pre-bent and tapered, round spring from Raven and the Aviation Products 10 degree option on the six inch tailwheel. I have some leeway to make adjustments with the mounting of the spring, but not by that much. Hopefully, this is mostly a problem because there isn't any weight to speak of yet.
New tailwheel arrived
Got the new Aviation Products tailwheel for the new round tail wheel spring. Some steel I need for the rudder and elevators mods arrived as well. I'll head out to the hangar tomorrow to try to finish up the rudder ribs and mount the new tailwheel.
Skybolt flight
I was offered a ride to Akroville Sunday in a local Skybolt that was recently completed. The builder did an outstanding job and generously allowed me some stick time on the way. Here's a picture while at NW Regional. He kept it in an open cockpit configuration, which I prefer and apparently ended up with one of the lightest Skybolts around. The attention to detail was outstanding and there is a lot of custom work that isn't readily apparent from the outside.
Wolf Pitts gear
Trial fit of the new gear. Need to make a few adjustments, but looks great overall.
Rudder progress
Welded up the trailing edge tubing on the new rudder. The shape turned out nice. It's basically a copy of the Wolf Pitts layout, but with a tighter radius on the bottom corner.
