Tail Kit Arrival!

 I received a call today that my tail kit has finally arrived at the local delivery warehouse.  I paid the bill, a whopping $1,125 for freight from the west coast and scheduled delivery for Monday morning.  This gives me the weekend to straighten up the garage and make space.

I have been drilling and countersinking the wing spars the last few days.  I have completed the fuel tank nutplate countersinking but I have run into a snag.  The wing kit does not come with any trim bundles of extra metal.  So I have no extra piece to make a countersinking jig to test the depth with.  So I started working on the tie down for the time being while I wait for the kit.  I am trying to avoid flipping the spar over since I have it all mounted up.  My thoughts are finish prepping the spar before putting it back into the crate for storage.  This way, I can remove the spar and get right to work once I finish the tail kit.  I think it be better to not be mid completion in the one section when going into long term storage.

So I put away the wing spar and cleared off the workbench.  I inventoried the large crate last night and everything was perfect.  I have to do the small hardware bag but that can wait a few days. I’m hoping to do the smaller crate later this week after the holiday weekend.

Priming Take 2 and First Drilling

 So I had to redo my priming setup based on the issues found during my first session.  Luckily I had some scrap wood lying and I had an idea.  I went to the hardware store and got some wire netting which I stapled across the wood as a frame.  It allowed me to spray down and through the frame with no issues of sticking.  I quickly flipped the parts over and sprayed again without issue.

After ironing out my priming setup, I moved onto match drilling the J stiffeners.  They require you to mount at a specific measurement and drill along the length.  It is a lot of holes to match drill on one flange alone.  With some manipulating and moving as I went, it took me about an hour to do the top flange.  I am going to do all of the countersinking and river the nutplates before I flip the spar and do the bottom flange. I figured this would be easier instead of continuously flipping this spar over repetitively.  I now need to setup the counter sink cages and get those dialed in.

The new priming setup.  This worked much better than the paper itself.  

In other news, I received notification today that my empennage kit is finally shipping out today.  Its exciting to think that I will have a tail kit next week sometime.  However, I need to make space on the garage floor for it to sit.  My wing spars need to be stored appropriately and the minds at be seem to think storing them flat is optimal.  I am currently debating finishing the one wing so it can be put into the wing stand, but I am not sure.  I am very torn as it would be a great way to store the parts and open up additional space, however the work would take me quite awhile to do.  The other option is to put the spar back as it is, move some parts around and deal with the tail kit right away.  Either way I will be looking for space to store things as I continue building.  I'll post back what I decide to do in the next update.

Progress...

So news came yesterday via email. Our wing kit is ready to be scheduled for crating and Van's wants all of my money. I was a bit shocked as we haven't heard anything on the tail kit still. I requested more information but still haven't heard back. I decided to query some other builders and my local EAA Tech Advisor for their opinions.  A lot of people seemed to believe if I wanted to spend time prepping all of the wing kit, that would eat up alot of my time. Then hopefully I will get my tail kit while i'm working on that. Worst case scenario, I finish up the prep work and start on the smaller surfaces. Only time will tell, but I am excited to at least get some information about one of the kits coming. Since I might be getting the wingsn first, I decided to do some research into wing items. The biggest thing that I eventually have to decide will definitely be the lighting. I am torn between the FlyLED's products which are highly recommended and liked by many builders. The other option is the Aveo ZipTips which are a one piece fit all where all lighting is built into the wingtips. However, I have heard a few things about them which doesn't make me happy. I have heard the trailing edge doesn't quite match the ailerons on many planes, the assembly is delicate and some had issues, and the shipping can take quite awhile. To not help matters, the ZipTips are probably triple the cost of FlyLED's solutions.

FlyLED's Original Lighting

Aveo ZipTips

The downside to the FlyLED's is that I probably will need to cut into my wing leading edge for the landing light install. This isn't a super big deal, but it definitely makes you nervous. I have to do some more research into the Van's light kit and an aftermarket one from Duckworks. The duckworks seem to have better documentation, but some of the online talk suggests they have a smaller lens. Will have to report back. Now to wait for more details on when the kit will actually ship or more details on the tail kit.