Van's Air Force
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Jig for Empenage and Wing
- Thread starter gpiney
- Start date
gpiney said:
My -7 is match drilled and I didn't use the jig. Came out pin straight. There's just one thing, though...when it's all clecoed together, you don't really want to rivet with the pieces sitting on clecoes cause it can leave nasty scratches around the holes (sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't) so you have to find some way to support it. I just picked up a bunch of foam from the local fabric store and used it to support the parts off my bench while I was rivetting but I would have preferred to have it in some sort of fixture (which I was much too lazy to build).
scroll to the bottom to kinda see what I mean. In the pic it was just resting on there...when I was actually rivetting I was careful to make the foam nice and even so it wouldn't wobble around.
http://www.ballofshame.com/flying/rv-7/buildLog/20060114.php
I am going to use a jig for the wings, though. After getting through most of the emp, I think having the wing jigged will probably just make working on them easier even if it's not nescessary to keep it straight.
Jamie
Well Known Member
Hmm..
Maybe this should go into the neverending debates, huh Doug?
Anyway, when I built my wings I built a simple stand out of 4x4's and steel angle from Lowes. Worked well.
I didn't secure the rear spar...meaning that it wasn't really a precision jig. I would occasionally check for twist using the plumb bob method and there never was any (with skins clecoed on, that is). When I mated my wings several months back the Smart Tool confirmed that there is 0 twist in my wings. You mileage may vary. Jigging the wings is the only sure fire way to know that you don't have any twist. But the 'old timers' on this list will tell you that you should buy the wood for your jig early and let it sit and acclimate to your shop environment because wood does warp and deform as it dries.
Do what you like, but just a simple stand worked for me.
...and some skinned wings....
Also, you'll notice that I mounted my horizontal bars rather high. I did that intentionally because the plans have you build the tanks and leading edges on the workbench, so there's really no good reason to get up there to reach them unless you're screwing the tanks on. Mounting everything higher gets the real bulk of the riveting up to your chest level. This worked very well for me.
Here's a shot of my wife pretending to rivet (absence of hearing protection being the most obvious evidence of fakery...that and the smile).
Maybe this should go into the neverending debates, huh Doug?
Anyway, when I built my wings I built a simple stand out of 4x4's and steel angle from Lowes. Worked well.
I didn't secure the rear spar...meaning that it wasn't really a precision jig. I would occasionally check for twist using the plumb bob method and there never was any (with skins clecoed on, that is). When I mated my wings several months back the Smart Tool confirmed that there is 0 twist in my wings. You mileage may vary. Jigging the wings is the only sure fire way to know that you don't have any twist. But the 'old timers' on this list will tell you that you should buy the wood for your jig early and let it sit and acclimate to your shop environment because wood does warp and deform as it dries.
Do what you like, but just a simple stand worked for me.
...and some skinned wings....
Also, you'll notice that I mounted my horizontal bars rather high. I did that intentionally because the plans have you build the tanks and leading edges on the workbench, so there's really no good reason to get up there to reach them unless you're screwing the tanks on. Mounting everything higher gets the real bulk of the riveting up to your chest level. This worked very well for me.
Here's a shot of my wife pretending to rivet (absence of hearing protection being the most obvious evidence of fakery...that and the smile).
Build the jig! It's extremely easy, it's not precision, and it will make the wings very easy to work on. Plus, it makes it easy to check for alignment. Before I built my first RV, I was against jigs. I thought that time would be better spent working on the airplane. I promise you that you will save more time than you waste.
Mel...DAR
Mel...DAR
