Author: Neal

Last night I decided to build a small table to support a back riveting plate, so I could try to back-rivet the #30 rivets holding the seatbelt lugs to the top skin. I found some scrap plywood and 2×4, and with some trial and error made a little table.

Tonight I tried it out, and was able to quickly and easily backrivet both lugs… except for the inner-most rivets on each side. They are too close to the bulkhead, and with the skin angles, I couldn’t get my backrivet set onto the rivet head. So I decided to buck those with the gun and bar, and it went fine. The problem is, I damaged the next rivet over in the process. These rivets are all close together, and I just wasn’t thinking. I ended up repeating the mistake on the other side before realizing what I had done. So, now I am going to remove one of the rivets on each side and redo them. It sucks trying to remove these fully-installed rivets, because it’s hard to get a grip on the now mangled shop heads.

I’m going to call it quits for tonight and try to get these tomorrow.

Today I riveted the two rivets I missed last time, securing the seatbelt lugs to the F-01406C bulkhead. I used an offset rivet set, and found I needed to tape both my tungsten bucking bars together to have enough mass to set the rivets without using a scary amount of air pressure on the gun. I had the gun set to 35 PSI, and that worked great. The rotisserie made this so easy, I quickly rotated the fuselage to either side before setting the rivets. It made for easy access, and both rivets were set with no problems.

Then I moved onto the next step, riveting the bulkhead to the top skin. I was able to reach every rivet with the hand squeezer, and set them all quickly and easily.

By now it’s too late in the evening to use the rivet gun, so the next round of riveting will wait until tomorrow.

Tonight I worked on installing the upper seatbelt lugs. I was able to squeeze 3 of the 4 rivets on each side, but the last, outboard-most rivet will need to be set with an offset attachment using the gun and bar. It was too late in the evening to make that kind of noise tonight.

The rotisserie was super helpful, and the clearances were good, but rather tight. overall I’m pleased with how it’s working out.

Tonight I riveted the seatbelt lugs together, then clecoed them to the fuselage. I had to clean and oil my hand squeezer. It’s been so long since I used it!

I didn’t have too many problems once I had the right yoke on the squeezer, and fiddled around to find the right angles.

Tonight I started working on the shoulder harness seatbelt lugs. I separated, deburred, countersunk and then primed the few parts.

Tonight I installed the F-01406 bulkhead. This was a quick and fairly easy job, one side at a time I removed clecos and installed the bulkhead pieces per the plans, and then clecoed it back together. I clecoed almost every hole to get this joint as strong as possible before I move the fuselage onto a rotisserie for riveting.

With help from my friend Simon, we were able to attach the aft and forward sections of the fuselage today! It’s amazing to see the size of the fuselage now, it is now so big that I can’t possibly move it by myself.

We didn’t get too far, we just clecoed together the parts, but they will stay together now for good. Everything went smoothly, and the holes lined up perfectly without the need to do any real finessing. I was surprised at how easily it all came together, just following the instructions. The only snag we encountered were a couple of temporary rivets that I had missed. Once we removed those, everything was great.

Tomorrow I’m planning to attach the two halves of the fuselage. This will be a big step, and it’s exciting to be at this point! My friend Simon is coming over to help me with the alignment of the parts which I’ve heard can be tricky.

Tonight I got ready for that step by rearranging the garage, and completing a few final tasks. I removed the temporary rivets holding the skins and ribs of the forward fuselage, along the trailing edge. I also bent two of the flanges of the aft fuse per the plans, and set up some safety straps, suspended from the rafters.