Started on the tail cone with fabrication and tapping of the tie down block. Tapping was straight forward, just took my time and backed the tap out every couple of turns. Then clean the tap, oil and repeat. Took several iterations, maybe a dozen or more. Cleco'd and match drilled the hole down to the two aft F-1012 bulkheads.

Proceeded with some light fabrication of the rudder cable support bracket and drilling for nut plates. Drilled the #12 holes in the drill press thinking they'd come out nice, but they are totally triangular and the AN bolts don't fit well. Time to buy a set of reamers for all the common bolt sizes. Might as well order static ports too; I'll need them soon enough.

Straightened the horizontal stabilizer brackets. As stated in the plans the parts were well out of flat and required bending back in the vice. My vice setup is far from ideal, but I did manage to get it whacked back straight using the method in the plans.

Cleco'd the HS stabilizer brackets to the F-1011 bulkhead and match drilled the rudder cable bracket and stiffener.

Excited to be working on the tail cone. Gonna be a lot of work. And a lot of priming.

Purchases: Cleaveland Tool: reamers, static port