Mar 26, 2020     Spar studs - (3 hours) Category: Wings

Nothing to see today, but there was a lot of work done on the spar studs. Spent some time fitting up the studs and getting them seated as best I could. It was a combination of delicate wrench work and some gentle love taps with a rubber mallet. The aluminum nuts on either end of the studs have a shoulder machined onto them that fits within the oversized hole in the washer plate. Everything is built to such tight tolerances that there is little space for the shoulders to fit into.

Although these studs are 12mm in diameter and the nuts use a 22mm socket, I have to resist the temptation to over-torque them. They are not AN bolts and there's really no need to have them very tight. The nut is there to prevent the stud from backing out of the hole, connecting the spar plate to the spar.

Had a couple of studs that required a little extra love to move and now I will have to replace them with new ones. Another order for AC Spruce.

Once I was satisfied with the stud placement, I started filling the gaps in the spar notch with epoxy thickened with flox. The epoxy mixture also worked into the lighting slots in the spar plate. I thought it would only take an ounce or two to fill these gaps, but it ended up being closer to 6 ounces due to the lighting slots.