Forward Fusekage RH Side Panel (1)

1 hour

Chipping away at this thing some more.  Now that I have the upper longeron, I drilled it to the skin and then fit the upper motor mount bracket and three more little gussets.  That's finally all the parts!

Forward Longerons, part 2 (2.5)

2.5 hours

I wasn't really looking forward to working on these things again, but I finally got them done!

The process I think, after making three of these now, is this.  For the ends that need to be cut off, first drill a 1/4" hole in each corner, then use a dremel cutoff wheel to connect the holes.  Leave as little excess material as possible!  Then clean up the edges with an angle grinder flapper wheel, then files, then a scotchbrite pad.

For the slots, drill a bunch of holes slightly smaller in diameter than the width of the slot, then connect them and smooth out as much as possible with a dremel carbide cutter... thing.  Then smooth everything out with a small file.

These parts took forever but in the end they turned out alright!

Turtle Deck Skin (1)

1 hour

I figured I'd put this thing together before the fuselage starts taking up too much space.  Everything was pilot drilled so it was quick and easy!

Forward Fuselage Side Panels Partial Riveting (1)

1 hour

I went ahead and riveted some of the parts that won't need to be removed anymore.  I left the verticals alone, since I'll still have to drill the gussets to them that'll connect them to the upper longerons.

Forward Fuselage LH Side Panel, part 3 (1.5)

1.5 hours

I got all the LH side panel parts deburred, cleaned up, and clecoed back together.

Forward Fuselage LH Side Panel, part 2 (0.5)

0.5 hours

I didn't have much time to work on this thing, but I got everything updrilled!

Forward Fuselage LH Side Panel + Former Clips (2)

2 hours

Starting on the LH side panel.  Just like the other side, I got everything drilled to the skin except the upper longeron and the few parts that interface with it.

I also got a couple new parts in the mail so I could redo these former clips.  This time I did my due dilligence and used a piece of 1/4" rod to bend the 1/8" radius instead of just winging it with the hand seamer.

Forward Fuselage RH Side Panel, part 2 (4)

4 hours

Continuing on the RH side panel.  I got the rest of the parts that I can fit without the upper longeron done.  All that's left is the upper longeron, the upper motor mount bracket, and three little gussets.

Everything pilot drilled to the skin

These motor mount brackets are pretty cool billet parts

Updrilling

Everything cleaned up and ready for rivets!

Firewall Details & Forward Fuselage RH Side Panel (1)

1 hour

After goofing up that longeron I needed to do something easy, so I built these firewall reinforcement pieces, and riveted together the upper firewall.  It doesn't get a whole lot easier than that!

Next I started pulling out parts for the forward side panels.  I figured even without an upper longeron I could probably still get something done.  I got several of the parts drilled and clecoed to the RH skin before calling it a night.

 

Forward Longerons (5)

5 hours

I started with the lower longerons, which were pretty easy.  They're just 1" angles that needed to be cut to length and then get a 30° angle on the forward end.  Simple!

The upper longerons were not so simple!  These parts are square tubing, and they each neeed three slots cut in one side, a chunk taken out of two sides on each end, and a 30° angle on one end.

For the slots, I I drilled a bunch of holes close to each other on the drill press, connected them with a dremel cutoff wheel, and then did some filing.  I got sick of filing with my tiny file so I got them part of the way and then worked on the ends.

For the ends, I used a combination of dremel cutoff wheels and a hacksaw at an angle to get most of the material removed.  I realized later that drilling a hole in each corner and then connecting them was much easier than trying to file all the way to the corner!  Anyway these also still need a bunch more work but I got sick of looking at them so I moved on.

After that, I put the 30° angle on the end of the RH piece, but as soon as I finished I realized I had put it on the wrong end!  So I'll get to do that whole right side longeron again.  After that debacle I had to call it a day on these things.

Forward Fuselage Side Panel Verticals (1)

1 hour

All I had to do on this page what cut out some small hinges and drill them to a pair of channels.  Everything else came with the kit!

Tail Post Assembly, part 3 (0.5)

0.5 hours

Now that I have the correct hardware and I've drilled the tail spring rod to the bracket, I was finally able to complete the tail post!

Tailwheel Spring Rod (2)

2 hours

This was a task I was kind of dreading because I heard drilling titanium is a pain and drilling perpendicularly into the side of a cylinder is tricky anyway.  The plans don't really direct you to do this until you install the landing gear on the fuselage, but I think doing it now is way easier.  Since the tailwheel spring bracket isn't attached to the tail post yet, I could clamp it up in the dirll press which helped a lot.  Anyway here's what I did:

First I clamped the steel bracket in my drill press vice.  The square flange on the end helped to clamp it down straight.  Then I drilled a 1/8" pilot hole through one side.

Next I inserted the spring rod to the correct depth, and made a Sharpie mark on the rod through the hole.  Then I clamped the rod in the vice, and very carefully made just the start of a hole on my mark.  I choked way up on the drill bit in the chuck to minimize any flexing.

Then I put the rod back into the bracket, lined up the holes, and clamped them together.  The bracket is thin enough that I could clamp them pretty snug with this little bar clamp with rubber feet.  I got everything lined up with the drill again and clamped it back up.

 Then I drilled the 1/8" pilot hole through the whole assembly.  In retrospect I should have just started with a larger bit, and someone on the forums even told me to do that but I forgot.  The 1/8" bit worked fine, but it just took a while to get through the titanium.  I had to go slow and use plenty of cutting oil!  I got it updrilled to 3/16" and then clecoed it together.

Next I took the bracket off of the tailwheel that the rod goes into, and carefully drilled a pilot hole through one side of it.  I forgot to get a picture of that part.  Anyway, then I assembled it back onto the wheel, inserted the rod into it, and set everything flat on the table.  Now I had to start being real careful.  The goal was to have the bracket vertical and the wheel nice and square on the surface.  I used a square to get everything as straight as I could.

Once I was pretty confident in my alignment job, I marked the rod through the hole in the tailwheel bracket, removed the bracket from the wheel, and clamped it all back on the drill press again.  Then I carried the pilot hole slightly into the rod.  Luckily this bracket fits real tight on the rod so it was easy to hold still while drilling, since I couldn't figure out a good way to clamp it.  Once I had a good mark on the rod, I pulled the bracket of and drilled the rest of the way through to avoid tearing the bracket up during the long drilling operation.

I clecoed everything back together, reinstalled the wheel, and checked the alignment again.  Everything looked good, so I went back and updrilled both holes to their final size of 1/4".

I don't have the correct bolts yet, but I threw a couple random AN4 bolts in to do a final check on the whole thing.  As far as I can tell it turned out pretty well!

Random Parts + Organization (1.5)

1.5 hours

I didn't get a whole lot of building done today, but I went through all my boxes and piles of random parts and tried to organize a bit for the next few pages.  There are a lot of parts!

I also cut a small notch on the back of each turtle deck skin.

This big assembly will form part of the wing spar tunnel much later.  It still needs a lot of work; I'll have to countersink and dimple a lot of holes for flush rivets.

And I built these little assemblies:

Finally I divided up a lot of the parts into boxes by plans page.