Rudder progress
I finally have progress to show today. I decided that I must prime and rivet the rudder stiffeners to the skins before I could continue with rudder construction. The stiffeners are critical to the shape of the rudder skins and I don’t think the match drilling of the rest of the skeleton would come out right if they were just clecoed together.
So, I scuffed the (fluted) stiffeners with a scotchbrite pad, scuffed the skin insides with a nice new Sioux orbital sander with a scotchbrite pad on it. The sander worked great with the scotchbrite for the skins. Note that I scuffed the skins before I dimpled them. I can see using this method for final paint on external surfaces. Then I washed the parts with soap and water and rinsed. Then they got scrubbed with MEK for final cleanup before priming. I primed the parts with Sherwin Williams 988 in a spray can. I decided to do this for these parts because I’m not quite ready to do my big batch of primer. So shooting primer from a spray can is only for when I have to have something primed quick and it is only a few parts.
After priming, I loaded up the skins with rivets and rivet tape to hold them in place, flipped them over on the back rivet table, and back riveted the stiffeners on. Believe it or not, these are the first rivets that I have driven on the plane. Of course I practiced on something else. I’ll repeat the general consensus: A monkey could produce perfect flush rivets with this method. They all came out just fine. That was a lot of fun.
With the skin stiffeners primed and attached, I clecoed the skins to the skeleton that I had previously constructed. This is where we pickup next time. Next is to match drill the skins to the skeleton, fit and match drill the trailing edge wedge, and machine countersink it (not looking forward to that).
