It was time to be done with this silly little trim tab and move on. So today's task was to finish riveting the tab skin and elevator skin to the tab hinges and install the darn thing finally.

We left off with those two challenging rivets. The two that I just couldn't really get to with anything. I looked at these two rivets for a good bit, trying different bucking bars, yoke heads and trying to come up with a plan. As it turns out, I didn't need to buck them. I was actually able to start setting both of them with the no-hole yoke and then finish them off with the regular 3" inch yoke. It actually worked out great and I finished those two off fairly easily. I have done this before in areas that are really hard to get to or that don't have the clearance to be able to get a squeezer yoke or bucking bar in there. Where there's a will there's a way I guess. Now here was my dilemma. After setting these last two rivets on that side of the trim tab, I had 15, 3-4.5 rivets left. Exactly the number I would need to rivet the top portion of the hinge to the underside of the elevator. So no pressure!

I cleco'd the top half of the hinge to the underside of the elevator and made sure the alignment was correct. I was actually relieved to realize that there was way more room to work in this area than I had originally thought which made it easy to set these 15 rivets with the normal 3" yoke. So working right to left I set each one carefully as I didn't have any extra rivets to spare. Again the plans here call for a 3-4 sized rivet, THIS IS WRONG, DON'T DO THIS. This area which is the same as the opposite side on the trim tab, same amount of material thickness to go through, needs this slightly longer rivet to get an acceptable rivet set. So I set all 15 and was quite proud of myself for not screwing any up. It was time to match the loops of the hinge and insert the hinge pin to finally, finally have the trim tab attached. The hinge pin at this point has been out and in so many times that it's not 100% straight any longer which makes it really tough to put in and take out. No worries as I have plenty of it leftover from the extra hinge that I ordered so I'll just use a new one after this final test fit. Everything looked good at first and then it hit me......

You have got to be @#$%ing kidding me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I riveted the hinge on upside down!!!!! I can't believe I did this!!!! This is literally what I did with one of the hinge sections when I was initially mocking it up last week and I promised myself to be more careful!!! And worse yet, I don't have any of the right sized rivets left!!! For once instead of screaming and cussing, I just laughed. It's all you can do sometimes. The fix is relatively simple, just drill out all 15 rivets, turn the hinge over and do it right. But now I don't have any rivets to use.... or do I......?

So first things first, after having a good laugh at my stupidity, I decided to go ahead and carefully remove all of these very nicely set rivets that I had been so proud of. I was determined not to elongate any of the holes so as not to have to go up a rivet size which wouldn't be the worst thing but also not the easiest. So carefully and slowly I drilled each rivet out being careful to stay centered in the rivet head and low and behold, I got all 15 out without a problem. Whew.....

But now I had a thought. Sitting right next to me is the wing kit which arrived back in January. Surely, surely there had to be some 3-4.5 rivets in that box of kit hardware. There were so many bags of rivets in there, there just had to be some that I could use. A quick trip over to the worktable to look at the kit inventory list and sure enough, there was indeed a bag of this sized rivet. My only problem is that box of hardware is buried inside the main crate which is sitting underneath the crate holding the wing spars. I really didn't feel like taking all that and moving it just to get to this box but in the end, my desire to get this thing completed today won out and after dinner I ended up moving the wing spars off the big crate and opening it up to find the hardware box and the bag of 3-4.5 rivets. Fortunately there were plenty in there and I was able to finally and correctly set the rivets attaching the upper hinge section. So in the end all it cost me was time and a little work to get to those rivets. I will just order some new rivets to replace what I have used. So whew! With those rivets finally set and the hinge section in place correctly I attached the trim tab, made a new hinge pin section and bent the end over as a temporary hold until down the road when the whole thing will get secured in place.

With that finally done, that's it. The left elevator, minus a few things is done. All the riveting is done, the trim tab is in place and functions normally. I decided to get rid of the vinyl and clean the skin. I also went ahead and attached the trim motor to its mount. I see that I need to clean up the edges of the attach plate as it doesn't quite sit flush with the skin. That should be easy enough to do in the coming days.

So that's it. After all the toil and struggle of the past few weeks, the left elevator is complete. FINALLY!

Next up, I need to roll the LE of the right elevator (not looking forward to that), attach the rod end bearings in each elevator and then it will be time to put them together along with the horizontal stab and check for fitment. From there they eventually get bolted together once everything is in alignment.

Before I get that far I need to do a few things which to get ready for that step. I would like my tech counselor Gary to have a look at everything before I get too far. As this is a critical step, I could use all the help I can get at this point. The trailing edges of both elevators need just a little adjustment for shape and a couple other little minor things. Not sure yet if I want to tackle the fiberglass tip work or leave it for later, we'll see.