Flaperons

Day 61: Complete Flaperons Repairs (2 hr)

September 4, 2011
Day 61: Complete Flaperons Repairs (2 hr)

During the week, a new box arrived from Zenith: This box contained my replacement nose skins for the horizontal tail: And some 3-way LED lights for the wing tips. These lights can do the strobes, the nav lights, and position lights all in one unit. And I was surprised how small they were. The...

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Day 60: Flaperon Repair Prep (35m)

August 21, 2011
Day 60: Flaperon Repair Prep (35m)

Some of you might remember (yeah, who am I kidding about that) I made a mistake in a flaperon by measuring the control horn placement from the wrong point. I’ve had the replacement horn and rib for some time now and with the elevator done for now I thought I would kill a little...

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Day 32: Completion of Left Inboard Flaperon (1hr 15m)

March 12, 2011
Day 32: Completion of Left Inboard Flaperon (1hr 15m)

Not much left to do on the flaperon today. During the week I had ordered more anti-corrosion protectant and so the first order of the day was to apply that where I had run out the previous weekend. Once dry I reassembled the skin and the ribs and riveted the top side of the...

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Day 30: Left inboard flaperon control horn (30m)

March 7, 2011

I did not get much done today! I drilled the rib angles for their respective ribs. I made sure not to repeat my mistake from the previous inboard flaperon and drill the holes for the root rib. These are defined by where the control horn gets situated. I got it right this time. From...

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Day 29: More Flaperons (2hr 20m)

February 21, 2011
Day 29: More Flaperons (2hr 20m)

Teri wasn’t available to help me fold over the skin on the right-side outboard flaperon right away so I started on the left-side inboard flaperon which was yet to have the spar attached to the skin. I got as far drilling out the holes in the underside of the skin lining up with the...

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Day 28: Two more flaperons on the go (2h 10m)

February 19, 2011
Day 28: Two more flaperons on the go (2h 10m)

I’ve used the “how to” DVDs that are for sale online quite a bit but that usually entails watching it in the house, then running outside to check on something, rinse and repeat. So I bought a portable DVD player from CostCo that I can put in the garage so I can watch as...

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Day 27b: Problems with the pax-side flaperon

February 13, 2011
Day 27b: Problems with the pax-side flaperon

When I was installing the L-angle onto the back of the control horn I thought it odd that there was such an overlap above the control horn. I didn’t spend much time thinking about it other than I’d have to file it down later. It is even easier to see here. But what becomes...

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Day 27: Pilot side outboard flaperon (1hr 35m)

February 13, 2011
Day 27: Pilot side outboard flaperon (1hr 35m)

Like many other days this one started out with deburring and priming the flaperon skin, spar and ribs. While the primer was drying I revisited the remaining 4 hinge brackets that were yet to have a corner removed. Now that I had a vise this was quite a bit easier to do with the...

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Day 26: Passenger side inboard flaperon (3 hr)

February 12, 2011
Day 26: Passenger side inboard flaperon (3 hr)

The flaperon skin gets riveted to the spar by cleco-ing both sides of the skin to the spar and ribs, riveting the top side of the skin and then bending over the nose skin to form the flaperon edge. Well, sounds easy! With the clecos in place, the top skin is easy to rivet....

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Day 25: Flaperon Control Horn and Skin Preparation (1h 30m)

February 6, 2011
Day 25: Flaperon Control Horn and Skin Preparation (1h 30m)

The back of the control horn is strengthened by attaching a strip of L-angle to the horn and spar. The location of the holes were determined by placing it under the skin and drilling through the skin holes, then moving the L-angle on top of the skin (where it will eventually be attached) and...

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