There are only two main items remaining before it’s time to fit the wing for the first time. Completing the forward upper fuselage, and assembling the baggage door. Neither of these go to full completion as there is avionics work that needs to happen before you actually close up the upper fuselage, but there is lots todo before the final close up.
- Fitting the upper skin
- Final Drill and Dimpling
- Assembling the baggage door
- Priming all of it!
- Riveting as much together as I can without closing up the top skin.
I started with the instrument panel and top skin prep.
Top Skin and Instrument Panel prep
Baggage Door fabrication and assembly
Next up was building up the baggage door. There are some unique parts you have to fabricate as the locking arms of the baggage door. To get the hole centered on the rod, I used a technique James showed me earlier. Pretty cool little jig! Besides that, the assembly and prep was pretty easy.
Priming Day!
This may be the last major priming day I’ll need to do! What a trip it has been learning the process, and all the hours spent prepping for the booth… but I can honestly say I won’t miss it! I’ve found myself moving more and more to the rattle can for smaller assemblies, and I’m not sure there is much that would require the booth going forward. Maybe the fairings? Alexander and Sam came by to help out, and we got it knocked out in a full day session.
After Priming was done, Giacomo came down to help with final riveting. There’s not actually much to rivet as the plans call for delaying installation for as long as possible to make avionics installation easier. We ended up riveting and watching the super bowl. Fun hangout time with Jack.
And with that, we are as far as we can get until avionics are ready to go! Next up…. fitting the wings! That is going to be a major milestone and I’m excited to get going. Probably a next weekend project but I’m sure I can find little things here and there to do in the meantime. Until then… Happy Building!
1 comment
Moving fast. Good job