July 27, 28 & 30th, 2002 ~14 hours

Finally some progress on the fuselage.  The first thing to complete is the forward bulkhead.

This is the forward bulkhead clecoed together. 

Then it was the usual take everything apart and deburr and dimple the holes in the stainless bulkhead.  Dimpling was a little different as I had to put the receiver die on bottom instead of the male die due to the edge being turned down on the stainless plate.  You countersink the stiffeners.

I primed all the stiffeners but not the stainless skin.

Cleco everything back together.

I back-riveted all the rivets but I wanted to make sure that everything was down tight.  I clamped all the brackets down while riveting them in place.

The fuel pump stiffener is the odd piece.  The flush heads of the rivets are facing aft.  There are no measurements called out for the platenuts but the drawing says that it is full size so I used it for a pattern.  Hope it's accurate.

And finally the finished product. 

August 1st, 3rd & 5th, 2002  ~16 hours

I'm really getting lazy at updating the web site.  It has ended up being more time consuming than I realized.  Hopefully, I'll get back into the routine of updating my progress on a day to day basis.  But right now it mimics my building, I seem to be able to build in spurts right now.  In the next couple weeks, school will start back, summer activities will slow down and maybe I'll get back into a more steady building routine.

All that being said, I've completed the 704 bulkhead.

One of the first steps is drilling out all the holes for the snap bushings. 

I put the close tolerance bolts in place before drilling or riveting.  Probably overkill, but not much trouble either.  A quick note: you can use the rivet gun on very low pressure (~20#) to drive these bolts in and out if necessary.

The right side riveted together.

The F-633 squared and clamped in place ready to drill.

The 633 that has been cut to reduce the weight.  I first drilled a couple of holes where the cut out angles would meet and then I used a jig saw to cut these things out.  I don't have a band saw and had been using a hacksaw to cut everything up to this point.

These things were pretty thick (.250) and I'm getting lazy.  The jig saw worked great.  I was concerned that it would leave a rough edge but the edge cleaned up very nicely with a scotch brite wheel.  Live and learn!

The instructions tell you that this is a good time to assemble the controls.  Then take them off, leaving the mounting brackets and continue on.  This is a wasted step.  It is not needed to align the mounting brackets as they are pre-drilled.  You end up having to take is back off and I honestly don't know how I'm going to get the bolts back through the holes in the same orientation as the plans call for without removing the mounting brackets.  Time will tell.

A couple of the brackets in place.

  And finally a couple pictures of the finished product.