Almost an empennage builder...

Well, I still don't qualify as a member of the club yet, but I do have the garage shaping up as a shop.

Just finished putting together a rigid 14" freestanding band saw and I have my eye on a 3x Avery kit with the addition of a drdt-2 dimpler and a pneumatic squeezer.

I am curious whether I could/should start the project prior to taking my one day sportair type course. I am antsy and I had a great month at work. Eh... probably should wait...

My wife so far is sharing my interest in building. We'll see how far that goes.

Studying plans...building work tables... acquiring tools. We are almost on our way!

Wade
7a emp soon

FWIW, I would wait and complete the one-day workshop. Otherwise I reckon you'll spend $$$ on replacement parts for the empennage trying to learn from scratch.

Use the time to get all the house/garden stuff you can out the way - as you'll not touch that for the next three to five years...

Sporran
RV-7 (Wirewall)
Scotland

Hello, Wade!

While you wait you might consider ordering the 'RV Training Kit' for $35 and practice on it. (order link here) I wouldn't recommend against taking a builder class by any means, but in my particular case I had a RV building neighbor come over one night and show me the essentials. I used the money I saved for tools .

Many methods....all good.


Best,

you'll need SOME type of help...

Hi Wade-

I'm about one step (only) ahead of you. I am currently building the training kit, and will order the -8 empennage within the next month. I am planning on taking the sheetmetal basics sportair course as soon as one is scheduled that I can reasonably get to.

To prepare so far, I have spent several sessions at the metal working and riveting tents at Sun and Fun (2004, 2005) and have logged hundreds of hours pouring over various builders websites. My shop is nearly complete (pneumatic squeezer anyone?).

I'm pretty handy, and in spite of the above, the training kit is not totally straightforward (no handholding in the instructions). Unless you've spent some time learning rivet types, matching drills to rivets, understanding that you dimple BOTH sheets, deburred a few holes, and know what "alclad" means, I wouldn't begin a major subassembly without some type of assistance.

For me, that will include the sheetmetal basics course. When has education ever been anything but a great investment?

I started my empennage about a month before taking the SportAir workshop. I didn't screw up any parts, because I refrained from doing anything I didn't know how to do.

For example, I drilled and clecoed parts together. I shaped the spar reinforcements on my bench grinder. I just didn't deburr or rivet anything until I was taught how.

Now, AFTER my SportAir course, I screwed up a few parts at about $10 apiece...but that's hardly their fault!

thanks for the insight, all:

Yup, I thought of getting the kit and starting the reshaping and etc.. Seems that I must have learned a little something from memorizing all of those builder websites. I've also been studying the prebuild plans that Van's sells.

Funny comment about rivet BOTH sheets (saw the other post), but...

no such thing as a dumb question.

Wade

Fallguy said:

I am curious whether I could/should start the project prior to taking my one day sportair type course. I am antsy and I had a great month at work. Eh... probably should wait...

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Coming on one year ago I was in a similar position. After studying the plans thoroughly I determined that I could drill holes and cut metal without too many problems. I went ahead and did that. The sportair class was excellent, and I found that by starting I had a perspective on building I don't know if I would have had.

Danny

Simple - Don't think - DO !

Get the empennage kit and even if you just spend a month looking, and deburring edges and reading plans it will be time well spent if you don't want to start prior to your course.

What you can do without any fear is to cleco parts together, try things out, get used to handling the materials.

We got ours way before we were ready and it was a great feeling to be able to say - yea, I'm building an RV !

Use the time to get a system organised for shop order - how many times have we all spent 20 minutes looking for part x or y, even when you have a sensible system. Why were the trim servo clevises in the drawer with the nutplates - I don't know, but they were

Enjoy the time, you will soon be bucking rivets.

mgomez said:

II shaped the spar reinforcements on my bench grinder.

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Using a bench grinder on aluminum isn't a good idea for two reasons.

1st. The grinding wheel can load up with aluminum. Notice all the aluminum still on the wheel? When the wheel loads up, the aluminum can expand at a different rate than the wheel, causing it to shatter. I?m not sure I would want to stand in front of my grinding wheel when it comes apart.

2nd. If you have ever used the grinding wheel on steel parts you can push those little bits of leftover steel into your aluminum which could (will!) cause you future corrosion issues. This is the same reason you never use steel wool on aluminum parts. FYI, they do make aluminum wool but I?m not sure where to find it.

For shaping aluminum I use both a small bandsaw and a $100 Delta bench sander from Lowes. If I ever have to sand steel parts, I change out the belt and/or disk to avoid the situation described above. The same goes for the deburring wheel.

While I?m giving out unsolicited advice, don?t forget to make some aluminum plates to go over the faces of your vices. This will keep you from damaging those expensive aluminum aircraft parts with the hard steel faces. I used some aluminum from the aviation section at Lowes. Let me know and I can post some pictures.

Now that was useful information

I remember from my days working in hospitals that you can't mix most people's blood together and give it back to them, but the idea of not touching steel to aluminum is new to me. I did see some mention of this on Dan's RVProject site; he primed where different materials came together (at least, I think that was Dan's site).

Bill, I appreciate the hard won knowledge that you have just imparted to me. I am curious if anyone has actually had their grinder come apart on them? That seems a little unusual, but hey--I've got a band saw and one pretty nice sander. Don't have the disk yet, but it is coming.

Let's see. I have a hundred and more drawers of little plastic organizer space and am just completing two eaa1000 workbenches. The garage is clean enough that one car space is all mine and I can back out the minivan from the other side. I have lighting installed above the workspace. And it looks like I'm ready to order the hunks-o-tail kit, huh?

There is actually room in the basic metal airplane class for next weekend, but I would miss all the airplanes at the Oregon Airshow (Thunderbirds this year). Hmmm...

What would you guys do? Put it off for another month to go see the airplanes? Or is getting started that wonderful (I guess finishing a month early would be that wonderful)?

FALLGUY said:

I remember from my days working in hospitals that you can't mix most people's blood together and give it back to them, but the idea of not touching steel to aluminum is new to me. I did see some mention of this on Dan's RVProject site; he primed where different materials came together (at least, I think that was Dan's site).

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The reason why Van's powder coats the steel parts is so they don't touch the aluminum parts. Here is a NASA web site that talks about dissimilar metal or Galvanic corrosion.

Fallguy said:

Bill, I appreciate the hard won knowledge that you have just imparted to me. I am curious if anyone has actually had their grinder come apart on them? That seems a little unusual, but hey--I've got a band saw and one pretty nice sander. Don't have the disk yet, but it is coming.

Click to expand...

I have never heard of the grinding wheel actually coming apart on anyone either but back in one of my collage tool and die classes (I have a manufacturing engineering degree) they warned us about not using a grinding wheel to shape aluminum for the reason I mentioned above.

As for Dan?s site not mentioning it, remember as good as Dan and his site are, they don?t cover all the building issues, techniques, and tips. If you read every RV site out there you MIGHT learn everything there is to learn about RV building.

To highlight the idea of pushing steel into aluminum I had a buddy once clean up the aluminum transmission case of his motorcycle with steel wool. Man did it ever look great when he finished. Then the tiny steel parts he pushed into the case started to rust. This happened just before the case started to have a real issue with dissimilar metal corrosion. When he figured out what the problem was he sold the bike. To this day I wonder if the ?new? owner ever realized why his aluminum transmission rusted.

Thanks Bill, thats a good one. I use Leather in my vise to keep from scratching the aluminum. The only problem is it tends to hold onto shavings if your not paying attention when you move the piece.

Jeff

Just to clarify, Bill

Not to beat the dead horse, but what I said was that I saw some mention of dissimilar metals having a problem, and I thought I did see it on Dan's site.

I very much appreciate your time and knowledge. If my tone ever sounds insolent, rude or obnoxious; please reread the post. That is never my intent.

Segue to my feeling of mini-accomplishment tonight (a bit of thread creep; but it's my thread), I just finished building the second worktable. They are both square, level and straight (after a couple of little tweaks). Whee, that was fun.

Thanks for some great responses, Bill. I hope you get 'er in the air soon (on purpose).

Fallguy said:

I very much appreciate your time and knowledge. If my tone ever sounds insolent, rude or obnoxious; please reread the post. That is never my intent.

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Don't worry, I didn't take it that way and my reply wasn't meant to sound insolent, rude, or obnoxious either. I think Dan's site is great and he has done us all a favor by posting the amount of detail he has. I was trying to point out that there is so much to building an RV that it is very difficult for one person or one web site to give you all the info you need. Not to mention the ability for a person to go through such a huge compilation of information and retain it all.

Back when I started my web site my intention was to provide photos for family and friends, who are scattered all around the US, with a chance to see what I was doing. From there I started getting requests from other builders for more detail. Just when I thought I would build a site like Dan's I discovered Dan's and said to heck with it, I'll just post things that are different, helpful or unique to the way I?m building my plane.

One other thought

When buying sandpaper, make sure it does not contain iron oxide. Otherwise, you will have the same problem as using the same sandpaper on both steel and aluminum parts.