23 MAR 14: Finished priming last piece – HS spar. Page 6-3 steps 6 & 7, page 6-4 steps 2 & 6: 1.75 hours

Went flying today, so not much time in the shop.  Finished priming the last little bit left (ran out of primer last night and was too late to mix another batch) – one of the HS spars.  Then started on dimpling and putting the VS together – finally!  First rivets since beginning the tail kit:

24 MAR 14: Page 6-4 step 7: 2.5 hours

Reassembled rear spar assembly and riveted together.  Took a while to get the touch for using the squeezer on the flanges and get the shop heads straight.  Took my time, checked every rivet, and it came out pretty well.  I’m really liking the nice finish the Akzo primer gives – tough as nails!:

25 MAR 14: Page 6-5 steps 1-3: 3.7 hours

Riveted the VS-1012 to rudder hinge brackets and the VS-1017 hinge doubler to the VS-1003 rear spar.  Attached the VS-1015 front spar doubler to the VS-1002 front spar.  Finished riveting the VS skeleton.  I was dreading the VS-1013 middle nose rib rivets as they are in an awkward position.  I had to use an offset rivet set and the angled edge of the tungsten bucking bar.  For my first 470 rivets of the build (-4s at that) and my first time bucking rivets on actual airplane parts, I think they turned out ok:

26 MAR 14: Page 7-6 step 11, page 7-7 steps 1-4: 3.5 hours

Drilled out and replaced 2 rivets in the VS.  Interestingly enough most comments I read say to leave well enough alone – i.e. the chance for buggering up the hole and fudging the second rivet is hi, and replacing is not worth the risk.  Even though these were cleated, they were TOUGH to get out once the head was removed.  I think this may back up the aforementioned comment:

Dimpled all holes in the flanges of the stiffeners, spar, and ribs of the rudder.  Riveted the R-1004 A&B rib halves, riveted the nutplate to R-1005 horn, and riveted the horn to the R-1004 A&B bottom rib:

Riveted the R-607/8PP reinforcement plates to the R-1002 spar and riveted the nutplates to the plates and spar:

27 MAR 14: Page 7-7 step 4: .5 hour

Finished riveting the R-1002 rear spar.  No pic.

28 MAR 14: Page 7-6 step 11, page 7-7 steps 5: 3 hours

Dimpled R-1001 rudder skins.  Back riveted R-1015 stiffeners to R-1001 skins:

29 MAR 14: Page 6-6 steps 2-9 – Finished VS: 10 hours

Finished up the VS today.  Front spar rivets:

Same from inside.  Marks on the spar web are only rub marks from the tape covering the bucking bar.  The spar would have been a wreck without the tape over the bucking bar:

I’m pretty happy with my work as a beginner.  I see why people talk about the first piece you build.  I definitely learned a lot in this structure.  I definitely gained confidence in riveting – especially bucking which, to me, really is the more difficult and critical part of riveting.  By the end of the piece I was able to feel how I was effecting the shop head with the bar, stop early if I wasn’t remaining square, and make the necessary correction.  Initially I was almost solely focused on the gun end – was worried about it walking all over -  but quickly realized I have to focus more on the bucking end.  As a testament to that, I have a few spots where I slipped with the bar and made some slight outward dents in the skin.  I initially had some second thoughts as a new builder bucking all of these alone (some very awkward angles/reaches), but I read an old post on VAF by Rick Gray about help vs. going it alone.  He made some excellent points about the solo route.  I’m very glad I did it all solo – I learned a ton.  I’ve bucked a bunch of practice rivets, but it is difficult to duplicate some of the angles/blind bucking that you do when  riveting the airplane.  Actually, I thought the dings would bother me more than it did.  Do I want them, no, but I was glad to get them out of the way – like the first ding in a new vehicle.  I’ve had other builders tell me how they miss the metal work when they’re at the 90% done, 90% to go phase, so a few years from now, I may redo the entire VS.  This one could serve as a nice conversation piece on the wall of my man cave – we’ll see.

Very happy with the way the C-frame dimples turned out.  Now that I think about it, I mentioned reading a post by Rick Gray – my C-frame was purchased second hand from Rick:

It’s been exactly 2 months since beginning my build.  I’ve spent all that time building, prepping, and priming all the pieces for the VS, rudder, HS, and elevators.  It was very nice to finally start putting pieces together and see a result of all that effort: