My RV-8 Empennage Stand

One of the things that I've pondered during the construction of my empennage is that since I don't have my fuselage yet, it would be difficult to do a mock-up of the completed empennage. I'm currently working on my elevators; everything else is complete (less fiberglass work), and I wanted to have the ability to hang my rudder and elevators properly, instead of just laying the components on my benches and slipping the components together. So I decided to do something even crazier than building my own airplane... I designed and built my own independent empennage stand. I spent 25 hours putting this thing together; there was a lot of trial-and-error fitting and redesigning... but I'm very happy with the result. Aside from the fact that the horizontal incidence may not be dialed in, I managed to establish the relationship between the horizontal and vertical stabilizers fairly accurately... and they are held very securely, so hanging the rudder and elevators will pose no problem at all. I had to share this with the group. Yeah... it's nuts... but it made for a nice change of pace, and it will be a very useful fixture until I get my quickbuild fuselage next spring. After that, I'll consider renting it out to any interested parties...

I think this is a great "builder assist" setup. It would even be handy if the details were documented in the construction manual!

If you happen to keep an on-line build log/website, I bet you will get some traffic by describing how to build this.

( This also begs for a picture of you In a chair in front of the empennage, making airplane noises )

Clever.

I notice your red dot "don't rivet this hole" technique. I did the same thing too. Squares of blue tape since that is what was handy in the hangar at the time.

This is awesome! Great job Martin! I can't imagine what kind of stand you would build when time for wheel fairings alignment comes.

humptybump said:

I think this is a great "builder assist" setup. It would even be handy if the details were documented in the construction manual!

If you happen to keep an on-line build log/website, I bet you will get some traffic by describing how to build this.

( This also begs for a picture of you In a chair in front of the empennage, making airplane noises )

Click to expand...

I don't think I will include the details in my kitlog, but I did post a detailed account of the build in my blogspot blog, which can be found at:
http://goatflieg.blogspot.com/

After completing my empennage, I needed to modify the stand to make room for the elevator horns... and I decided to upgrade it to conventional gear status with a 3-point caster undercarriage. I may have to do some milling to make more room for the elevator horns for down elevator travel... and maybe add a handle coming up from the tail post... but this is pretty close to a finished product.

Of course, I couldn't leave well enough alone, because it wasn't, well... enough. I did add the handle, and had to whittle away more wood at the back top to make more clearance for the elevator horns. This thinned out the structure a bit more than I was comfortable with, so I added some side gussets to reinforce the area. After mounting everything up and test-rolling, I realized the rear HS spar was bouncing a bit, so I built up a retaining tab off the center clamping fixture that would hold the rear spar down. I thought up a lot of different ways of securing the elevator horns so that I wouldn't have to clamp the elevators at the tips. After trying a few ineffective designs, I put four eyelet screws into the relieved area and secured the horns with two zip ties, which do a good job of holding the elevators exactly where I want them. So I think I've got it pretty well dialed in now. I might have to rasp off a little more clearance for the horns... and the finished stand puts the top of the VS & rudder over my head... so I'm going to come up with another adaptation. I'll use the center clamping fixture and build another VS spar saddle; mount them to a lower table to do the fiberglass tips on the VS & rudder. After all, I still have more than 7-8 months before I get the QB kits. I have time to putter...