May 18, 2014 25 hours, 377 hours total. I finished the wing build today, nearly 11 months after the start of the build. Total wing build time equals 230 hours. This is actual prep and assembly time- hands on the airplane. That averages out to be about 5 hours per week, shy of my goal of 8 hours per week. But as friends tell me, I still have a full time job.
I'm very satisfied with the build and the quality of the build and Van's design. I'm not sure how many 1000's of rivets I went through, but I put a pretty good dent into the box of rivets provided. I'd guess close to 3,000 rivets pulled.
My wings include the landing and position lights in addition to wingtip strobes. All were tested proior to final assembly and all functioned proberly.
Picture of all the flaperon skins prior to prepping. Additionally the flaperon longerons are in the backgroung.
Flaperon ribs, eleven on each side, along with the nose ribs and counter-balance assembly in the background.
Flaperon actuator bracket and inboard flaperon hinge point. The three rivet on the inboard side of the actuator bracket were very difficult to set. Took a couple of tries and a few choice words, but I got it done! Looks like the actuator bracket will insert into a groove [tongue and grove] in the fuselage for actuation and flaps operation.
Flaperon outboard skin with counter balance assembly. Thr counter balance [pipe] is initially attached with one rivet each to two mounting brackets. The pipe and leading edge skin are then match drilled 13 places. You can see the cleco's on the forward edge. Lining everything up and drilling into the steel pipe was a real challenge, bu it did come together nicely.
Counter-balance riveted in place!
Now it's time to install and rivet the trailing and leading edge skins.
A like magic, I have two completed flaperon assemblies, one the mirror of the other!
I'm 4.75 jars through the project, I'd guess about 4500- 5000 rivet shanks!
A end view of the flaperons showing a profile view with counter balance assembly
Then it was back to the wing tip fairings. The black compound is two part engine sealant. It went on a lot better than I thought. The material comes in a single tube. A dasher rod is used to dispense and mix the concoction. It was applied using a chauking dispenser. Man I'm glad it went on right. The stuff is like tar and sticks to everything. It went on much better than I thought! As you can see, rivets are in place
Once the sealant is mixed, that's it- what you don't use goes to waste. I probably used less than a third of the mixture. [Lesson learned- I was afraid I wouldn't have enough and ordered large.] In the trash!
Both wing assemblies are in the craddle, position lights installed along with flaperons!!! Done! Into the Fuselage.
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