May 27, 2024     Tie Down Ring attach brackets - (10 hours)       Category: Wings

You would think this little task of creating the tie down ring attach assembly would be easy. Well for me it was one screw up after another which probably made it take twice as long as it should have! Still getting my build game back up to speed I guess.

Sounds easy enough, use the supplied brackets and match drill the holes that are already drilled through the spar. My first error was thinking that if I followed the instructions for the location of the four main bolt holes, that I could drill them ahead of time without match drilling them in place using the spar as a guide. So the first try was quickly made unsuccessful as I tried to line all four holes up to the existing ones in the spar and I realized, DUMMY, just drill one hole and match drill the rest. So that was one bracket wasted. Fortunately I had ordered the brackets from Cleveland Tools which come with the threads already tapped into the ends. So I had two extra ones and it's a good thing.

Did I mention I had all sorts of trouble cutting the aluminum bar to the correct length. My setup on my band saw isn't great for holding pieces at 90 degree angles to cut and I kept cutting them too short or crooked. I had cut these spacers a while ago, I think last fall before I shut down for the winter. The plans have you cut a 1" lightening hole in the middle and that was a disaster as well. Then I read a builder who just skipped this process and I realized that duh, the weight savings given by doing this wasn't worth the effort. So before I started on the tie down brackets, I made four spacers that I deemed acceptable. More on the spacers later....

The whole point of buying the extra brackets from Cleveland Tool was to avoid having to run a tap into them. I've never done that before and I really didn't want to have to try if I could avoid it. But with one bracket already screwed up, I was going to have to tap the threads after all. So a quick Amazon order and I had a tap set on the way. Once I had it in hand, I used a small level to make sure the tap was going in as straight as possible and this seemed to work well. A little lubricant and eventually with patience it turned out fine. Cool, new skill I just acquired! I also realized I actually already had several taps as part of the tool collection that I bought way back in January of 2019 when I purchased the empennage kit third hand. So that's nice to know how to do that and it wasn't very hard to do after all.

So with a 'stock' Vans supplied bracket tapped correctly to accept my fancy tie down rings (also purchased from Cleveland Tool) I was ready to try again. This time armed with the knowledge of what not to do things went much better. With the bracket clamped to the spar, each spacer was inserted and snugged up to the spar web. With everything in place and clamped down tightly it was fairly quick work to drill the four main attach hole using a #12 bit and the holes for the platenuts/aileron support brackets. Cool, easy enough, time to scrub and prime.

Back to my least favorite thing, priming parts. Fortunately the parts were small and not covered in Alcad so it was just a simple matter to scuff and clean them and apply some rattle can primer. I decided to do one bracket at a time to keep the parts from getting mixed up. Before I painted the spacers, the plans have you lay out and drill the holes for the platenut attach points. You also need to countersink one side of the spacer platenut holes so that the rivets sit flush on the side of the spacer that butts up against the spar web. So BE CAREFUL here as it is very easy to C/S the holes on the wrong side. You also need to use the holes in the spacers to match drill holes in the bracket as well. So the whole process gets a bit complex as multiple parts get nested inside one another and it is VERY easy to screw this up as I did not once but twice!!!!

With the first set of parts primed and ready to be installed, I went to put everything together to bolt it all in place only to realize that I had drilled one side of the platenut holes upside down. IOW the spacer with reference to the bolt hole that gets drilled through it will have a longer length from the center hole to the edge than going the other way. This length needs to be about 1.5" and if you're not careful, like I wasn't, you can accidentally get the orientation of the spacer and all the holes incorrect and it won't fit. So that was another screwup and lesson learned. 2 years ago I would have been pretty upset, these days I just shrug my shoulders and laugh at how dumb I can be sometimes. To err is human I guess! So I had to make another spacer and drill the holes with the correct orientation this time. The problem was that I was running out of aluminum bar to use. Fortunately I had another one I could use and I fixed my error, reinstalled everything and low and behold, the four main bolt holes didn't quite line up. Hmmmm........

Turns out that not only do you need to get the holes all drilled correctly with the correct alignment, you also need to make sure the spacers are perfectly perpendicular to the bracket or you will have a fitment issue like I did. My experience having been at this now for 5 years told me that a simple file would fix the issue and it did. So a little trimming with the file, a fresh squirt of primer and everything finally fit correctly and was ready to be bolted together.

Sweet, that's one down, the second one should have gone much faster. It did, until it didn't. Once again, I was careless and this time I countersunk the platenut holes on the WRONG side of the spacer. (Bangs head against bench). This time I was mad. I had checked and rechecked my sides and orientation and SWORE I had done it right only to discover, that nope, I had dorked it up yet again. There was another problem. I was out of spacers to use that were long enough. Despite having ordered two extra pieces of AL bar, I had managed to cut most of them too short to accommodate the platenut holes in this spacer. For some reason and I can't remember why, I match drilled the holes for that one side at an angle instead of vertically up and down. Because of that, I needed just a smidge more length on this spacer and I didn't still have one that had enough length. So deep sigh, my hopes of finishing this task up over the Memorial Day weekend were dashed. Unless I could find the stock bar at the local home store, I would have to order through Amazon again and wait a few days by which time I would be out of town again for work. So I was pretty bummed about that. I looked and looked and looked and couldn't find any extra material that would be long enough. Unfortunately the local home stores only had that thickness and width in a steel bar. I considered using the steel stock but ultimately decided to just wait and ordered a set of new AL bars through Amazon. Then while cleaning my bench off, because the work was at a standstill, low and behold I managed to find about a 3" length of the AL bar! The holiday weekend was saved!!!

With the replacement bar in hand, another setup and match drilling of the various holes. This time I primed the spacer FIRST, then made sure everything was line up perfectly, used a sharpie to make a check mark on the correct side to countersink and installed the platenuts on the correct side. But just to add insult to injury I managed to get in a hurry and set one of the rivets without the platenut installed!!!! Now we were approaching crazy territory. All I could do was laugh at myself as I carefully removed that rivet than installed the platenut correctly this time.

With everything set, I went to line up all the parts and holes once again and yet again, the holes were just slightly out of true due to one of the spacers not being perfectly perpendicular. I have no idea how or why they got slightly askew, but again a little treatment with the file and all was good. I also had to use my 3/16 reamer quite a bit on the main bolt holes to clean them up and get the bolts to fit in without extra resistance. Where there's a will there's a way with the right tool!

So finally everything in place, I finished the main bolts off by torquing them to spec and installed the torque seal to show that they were finished. The final step is to install a pair of brackets on the front side of each spar that hold hardware for the ailerons. This is the reason for the platenuts on the brackets themselves. Easy enough to do right?? WRONG! Platenuts are a pain as I found out. Worse yet, I had a thing of Boelube at one point (which you should use to apparently lubricate the platenuts BEFORE trying to insert a bolt or screw for the fist time) and I threw it out because I didn't know what it was for!!! So off to Amazon once again to order some Boelube.

I am intentionally leaving the brackets loose so that when I have to install the aileron hardware, that should make it easier. It probably won't matter knowing my luck but I want to lubricate the platenuts anyhow before snugging those bolts back down.

  Oct 11, 2023     Not much to report - Vans Laser Cut Parts Debacle - (1 hour)       Category: Wings

Not much to add right now. There is some work that can be done but not much. I have 93 affected parts from my wing kit that either Vans says are unairworthy or I am deeming un-airworthy on my own. Most of those parts Vans is claiming are serviceable but I am calling BS. There are too many builders reporting cracking after dimpling laser cut holes in these parts. I am lucky, all I have to do is get new parts and then move on. There are many, many builders who are in far worse shape than myself.

I finally got around today to inventorying my kit for the affected laser cut parts today. In all I will need about 70 new parts from Vans before I can continue building. Vans for now is saying they will only cover the cost on 6 of those parts and that I will be able to purchase the remainder at a reduced price. No mention of who gets to pay for shipping back here to Ohio. No mention from Vans yet as to what the discount will be and how long it will be until new parts arrive. I am not holding my breath, I don't expect to see replacement parts this year. I did the math via a test order through Vans website, if I wanted to pay full price and replace all those parts on my own dime, I'd be looking at more than $1300 to do that. That's on top of the nearly $600 that Vans forgot to charge me in sales tax for the wing kit a year ago that they are now requesting.

So no updates forthcoming until this is all sorted out and no one knows when that will be or what it will ultimately look like.

The dream is in a holding pattern right now with no EFC......

  Aug 12, 2023     It's been a while! - (6.25 hours)       Category: Wings

Time to check in finally! Not a lot of progress to share. Been busy flying at work, Oshkosh 23' came and went and just not a lot of time to work on it. Then the laser cut parts issue reared its head....

As for the progress, still countersinking and installing nutplates on the right side spar. It's just about done. I need to C/S and install the smaller nutplates that hold the leading edges of the access panels. Once that's done, the right spar prep will be basically finished. Don't expect much progress in the next month as we have a family vacation, then a week at home of normal flying followed by a week long European trip. Did I mention I just got home from 6 days in South America! The pilot shortage is both good and bad!

As for the Vans laser cut parts saga..... I received an email from them the week before Oshkosh. The email said that certain parts contained in my wing kit are not airworthy and that others in the kit may also not be airworthy. Long story short, a sub-contractor they used to make parts did a really poor job with their laser cutting of the holes, so much so that some of the parts are completely scrap. Mostly the flap and aileron spars but also ribs in the wing kit. Vans is testing the affected parts to see exactly which ones are still usable and which ones are not. I have affected parts, that much I know for certain. How many will have to be replaced is TBD at this point. I'm awaiting (along with everyone else affected) Vans to tell me how to proceed.

What this ultimately means for me is that I will most likely end up having to wait on new parts from Vans. I'm lucky, I don't already have things like the flaps, ailerons, wings, empennage parts, etc. already constructed. There are some (rightfully so) really pissed off builders right now that are looking at having to rebuild large parts of their build. Glad I'm not in their boat so a delay waiting on new parts is nothing compared to what some people are facing.

So with that in mind, the building may have to slow way down (not like I'm flying as is) until the parts situation gets sorted out. For now I can finish the spar prep and get them mounted on their jigs. Fall is approaching and with it, the days of being able to work with ProSeal for the year are numbered. I'm considering just buying a finished set of fuel tanks if possible. That alone would save me probably 6 months worth of work. We'll see.

As for the pics below, just making consistent countersunk holes with the CS bit, measuring them with a caliper to make sure they are in spec (spec comes from a drawing out of the RV-14 plans). Nutplates installed with pneumatic squeezer which is easy to do. Once nutplates are installed then the actual #8 screw holes can be countersunk using the nutplate itself as a secondary pilot hole, works great!

So the pics are a bit out of order but the order is this, countersink the rivet attach holes to the proper depth, rivet the nutplates into place. Then countersink the screw holes using the nutplate as a guide. Spot prime those screw holes after you are finished. That's it, that's the process, not much to it. Rinse and repeat.

Next is to countersink the rivet attach holes and the screw holes for the #6 screws. Just need to find the right depth for the CS bit.

  Jul 14, 2023     Prep work on right hand spar continues - (3.5 hours)       Category: Wings

Time to attach all of the platenuts/nutplates to the spar web. Nothing too difficult, just repetitive. Start by upsizing the predrilled holes for the nutplates to #40 to accept the AN3 screws. Simple enough and glad I taped off all the openings as it generates a ton of shavings. With the holes opened up, you need to countersink each one to accept an AN426 3-3.5 rivet. Key is to get the depth just right, not too deep but not too shallow. The skins from the fuel tank will sit on top of the spar web in this area and any rivet head sticking up will make the skin not want to sit flush. After practicing a few holes on a scrap piece I had the countersink dialed in and again just a matter of making good countersink holes down the length of the spar web. Again this generates a lot of shavings so I vacuumed up the shavings quite often as it makes a mess. With the countersinking done, you can add the K1100-8 nutplates to the bottom side of the spar web flange and secure each on with a single cleco. This lets you line up the other attach hole and put a 3-3.5 rivet in it. I used the pneumatic squeezer to set each rivet in place. With that done the clecos can be removed and the nutplates are held in place. Now it's time to countersink the larger screw hole.

Before doing that, I needed to get the larger countersink set up to make the proper depth of cut. The platenut will host a #8 screw which is placed through a dimpled skin from the fuel tank. So you will have a dimple sitting inside a countersunk hole that leads into a platenut. Somewhat important to get the depth of the countersink correct to make sure everything nests inside themselves properly. To do that I tried countersinking a few holes in the scrap material. Unfortunately the C/S bit would immediately start chattering back and forth slightly in the hole as the pilot of the C/S bit had nothing to hold it steady. So I tried making a guide out of another piece of scrap and even that really didn't help. So it wasn't feeling very optimistic at first. Then I decided to actually just use a platenut and practice on that. After setting it up, I was able to drill a very nice countersunk hole, indeed as the Vans instructions indicate, the opening in the platenut will act a guide for the countersink bit pilot and allow you to make a nice hole without the chattering. I kept experimenting with the depth and a #8 screw until I had it where I wanted. I double checked the cut dimensions using a caliper and referencing the dimensions given in the RV-14 plans. Everything was in limits and this should result in good holes once I drill them into the spar web.

As I was experimenting with the practice platenut, I noticed that if the AN426 rivet heads sat a little high in their countersunk holes, this had a tendency to make the skin not sit completely flush with the part. So I ended up checking all those nutplates that I just riveted and decided to drill out the rivets on a good portion of them. I then went back and used the #40 countersink to increase the depth of those holes just slightly so that the rivet will sit absolutely flush to the spar web flange. The AN426-3 rivets are easy to remove fortunately. Replaced the rivets that were sitting slightly proud and called it a night.

Also in this series of work I started setting up the process to make the spacers used on the tie down supports. The spacers are made from a 1/4" aluminum bar that comes with the wing kit. I marked and center punched the locations for the holes to be cutout and will use a hole saw on my drill press to cut them out when I get to that point.

  Jul 09, 2023     Organizing the wing hardware - (2.0 hours)       Category: Wings

Needed to get the wing kit hardware organized and I got a good chunk of that done this evening in a few hours of work. Still have some more to sort and store away. Also spent some time yesterday researching and gathering reference material for the beginning of all the countersinking on the spar that is the next step.

HINT: There is a page from the RV-14 plans that gives you exact dimensions for the holes you will need to countersink into the spar. See picture below. These are meant for the 14 but are the same for the RV-8. This will allow you to physically measure the depth and radius of the countersunk holes to make sure you are not going to deep or making them too wide.

  Jun 29, 2023     Starting on wings - (1.0 hour)       Category: Wings

Just a quick start on the wing spars by inspecting them for damage, labeling them for orientation and taping off all the little crack and crevices that may hold metal shavings as I get ready to drill about a thousand holes and countersink them.

  Jan 29, 2023     Wing Kit Inventory - (3.0 hours)       Category: Wings

Time to get the parts out and inventory the wing kit. Way more parts than the empennage kit! Only managed to get through the parts, still have to inventory all the hardware bags which takes forever. So far just a couple missing pieces of hardware, no biggie. Should wrap this up tomorrow and then I will need to put most of it back in the crates for now until I can build some larger shelves downstairs to hold everything.

  Jan 23, 2023     Wing Kit Arrival - (.5 hour)       Category: Wings

My first official entry for the wings! ABF delivered the two crates right on time this morning. Fortunately for me, they brought a smaller truck and were able to back up right into the driveway which made offloading the two crates a piece of cake. I enjoyed a short conversation with the ABF drivers about the project and thanked them for the great service. Glad to have the crates safely home. Doesn't appear to be any damage.

14 months from order to delivery....... Vans gives you 30 days to inventory the kit, so that will be the next step with them and then they will stay crated up until I can finish the rest of the empennage.

  Aug 30, 2022     More delays for the wings       Category: Wings

Well bad news from Vans last week, the wing kit will be further delayed by another 4-6 months.... Very frustrating but they are having issues with their suppliers and especially the company that they sub-contract out the work for the main wing spars to. What are you going to do? Gotta have the spars to even begin construction of the wings. So this really throws the planning off. I thought I would begin on the wings this fall. Now it's going to be after the first of the year, at the earliest. Building in the heart of the winter isn't easy and I'm not sure how much I can accomplish for those few months assuming there are no further delays to the delivery schedule.

At this point (Sept 2022) standard wing kits are running 14-18 months for delivery, fuse kits for the 8 about the same. Quickbuild kits are even worse running 2+ years right now to get.

Good times!