It never got above 20*F outside today brrrrrr, after heating the space with my two electric space heaters I managed to get it up to 54*F according to thermometer on the wall, so very doable.

With the new cradle made it was time to put it to good use and get the top half of the left HS skin riveted in place. In total about 45 small -3 rivets to set so a good amount of riveting to be done. To my surprise, I managed to set all of them without messing any up. I used several different bucking bars and even switched hands and riveted left handed to give my right hand a break. Seems to take a good bit of strength to set these small rivets in tight quarters like this. I used a lot of masking tape to make sure I didn't ding my parts any more than necessary and I even managed not to drop any bucking bars the entire time!

Of all the bars I used, I kept coming back to the small tungsten bar that I have. Its mass and density just make it more effective when it comes to squishing these small rivets, its smaller size is also advantageous for this part. After all the rivets were set I removed all the tape (easier said than done) and I'm glad I did use the tape on the inside areas as even with it, I managed a few good scratches to the parts from the bucking bars.

With the top rivets set, the plans have you go back and repeat about the last previous ten steps for the right side which again starts with riveting the nose rib in place which is how I finished off my day, a productive day for sure and a confidence building day as well.

The plan is to finish riveting up the right side until I'm at the point where you insert the rear spar and rivet the final parts of the skin. I will pause there and have my EAA tech counselor inspect the work before I finish. Once it's closed up there really isn't any access to the interior parts of the structure.