Day 86

Got lots accomplished today.

Got the left fuel tank back off and wrapped the long-range tank line with the rubber PSA tape. Will mount it after we fix and leak test the tank once more.

We were able to source 4 bolt screws for the Pitot tube. (Why they were not provided in the box, we just don’t know…) After the plane is painted we will loctite them. We won’t do it now because if you paint over the bolts, when they are removed at some point for maintenance, it will crack the paint. Rather, we will remove them before painting and then reinstall them after it is dry.

Also, we took the wing jigs off of the left wing, now that the tank is fully riveted on. The one at the tip was a little tricky… We’re not sure if the jigs were meant to come off at an earlier time or not. We had chosen to keep them on until after the tanks were riveted on. (Made the wings easier to move around as well as the bottom rivets more accessible.) The bolts holding the jig on were impossible to get to with the wing skins on. It wasn’t a hard thing to fix though. We just drilled the jig backing panel off.

the root end come off without issue.

After the jigs were removed we pulled the rest of the rivets along the spars at the tip. We also Cleco’ed and riveted the two angle brackets that hold the wing top rib on.

After the angles were riveted on, we Cleco’ed the rib into place and pulled the various sized rivets that hold it on, taking care not to put rivets in the last three holes. The wing tip itself goes through these.

Next we’ll be able to fit the composite wing tip itself on.