After a two week break over Christmas and New Year, I spend a few hours today back-riveting the ribs and elevator trim access doubler, and riveting the right rear spar to one of the skins.
First I back riveted the left elevator ribs to the bottom skin. Here’s a picture of the right elevator at the same stage, which I did later in the day.
Next I riveted the right rear spar to the right elevator bottom skin. This calls for clamping to an edge, then shimming the ribs up so they don’t bend.
Then it was time to rivet the skin to the spar. This went well with no issues. I have a new camera in the garage to capture stills and video, I’m trying it out to see if it’s useful for helping document the build process.
Installing the doubler was a little tricky. I back riveted most of the rivets, but some were in awkward locations, so I squeezed a few. The 3-3.5 rivets are a little long, and a few of my rivets were less than perfect, but nothing I felt was worth removing and redoing.
Then I back riveted ribs to the top skins for both elevators. Here’s a picture of the left elevator tip skin with ribs riveted.
The next step is to join the skins by riveting them to the rear spar, then riveting the ribs together. Then the front spar gets attached, then lots of odd rivets to close out the elevators, then the trailing edge, and finally rolling and riveting the front edges. Feels like the end is in sight for the elevators!