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Any Experience With Substructure Dimple Dies on Wings?

avatty

Well Known Member
Does anyone have experience with using substructure dimple dies on the wing ribs (and standard on the skins)? I am wondering if this would help reduce the slight oil canning that is visible on some RV wings. The threads I have seen on this website discuss substructure dimple dies in terms of strength of the resulting joint, not the "tightening" effect these dies might or might not have on the skins.

Thanks in advance to anyone with experience to share!
 
My wing ribs were dimpled with the Cleaveland substructure dimple dies.

During skin fitting, I had some problems with oil canning on the wing bottoms.
When the wing riveting was completed, no oil canning. Did the substructure dimple dies help? I'm not sure. I believe the riveting pattern I used was probably more helpful in preventing oil canning rather than the dimple die influence.

That being said, I was pleased with the way the skins fit the ribs..I have very smooth skins and no oil canning :D
 
Thank you for the response, it sounds like the difference the dies might make is marginal, but no one has said it is a bad idea.

The -14 plans advise riveting the IB and OB wing skins from the center of each toward the root and tip, and riveting the lap joint last. Back-riveting is also suggested for "a higher quality skin finish." Any thoughts? And again, thanks!
 
Getting back after assembling the right outboard leading edge, using the substructure dimple dies resulted in an incremental, but noticeable, improvement in rivet flushness and a flatter finish to the skins. Or so said my peer group at the airport (of course I noticed it too).

Someone with more experience (this is my first project) perhaps could get the same or better results with conventional dies, but it definitely took my results up a notch.

Because the substructure dies make deeper dimples, and increase the size of the holes in the ribs, I found it necessary to use: (1) rivets a half size longer - 3-4 instead of 3-3.5 most of the work; and (2) hard packing tape instead of the soft office tape I usually use.

On the scale of things, I put the substructure dimple dies almost on a par with tungsten bucking bars, which I will only give up "when you pry them from my cold, dead hands."
 
I tried 'em. Didn't like them. They enlarged the hole to the point the clecos would fall out. To prevent rivet 'clinching', I made a couple of #40 size tabs to hold the clecos firm for riveting. But, after that first attempted, I just quit using the SS dimple dies.
 
Dies

I used the dies as follows.
Skin...Standard die
Layer two (ribs)...Tank die
Layer three...Substructure die
The layers seemed to nest much tighter. The substructure dies were not used all that often.
The only time I had issue with clekos was using Clekolock. Wedgelock clekos held the sandwich just fine.
 
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