RV-7 "After-Midnight Aircraft Factory"

[greghughespdx]

Lookin' good!

[Tdeman]

Built a new set of lightweight elevators, and decided to try the original “small” rudder. Down the road I may throw my counterbalanced RV-8 Rudder/VS on there, but we’ll see how this one does for now!

Lots of measuring and adjusting, but eventually got the emp all lined up and drilled.






Its getting to the point where I’m ready to start closing up the inside of the fuselage. Before doing that and losing access, I decided to test fit the wings to check for any areas that may take rework while I still have access.



Wings in place also made for a good time to fit fuel lines to fuel selector (which has its bracket mounted to the spar rather than a fuselage bulkhead.)







I also designed my panel and wiring harness for the full airplane. With that in mind, I was able to drill holes for wire pass throughs and install all "wire run" hardware. More on that in the next post...

[Vlad]

Nice bends on fuel lines.

[jcarne]

Heck ya man, things are looking great!

[JSOliveira]

Progress looks great.

Check with Vans on the advisability of the small rudder. My understanding is that when test flying for spin recovery, the 7 would not reliably recover from a spin with the small rudder. Certainly not as fast as they wanted it too.

[greghughespdx]

Originally Posted by JSOliveira

Progress looks great.

Check with Vans on the advisability of the small rudder. My understanding is that when test flying for spin recovery, the 7 would not reliably recover from a spin with the small rudder. Certainly not as fast as they wanted it too.

The rudder was redesigned for the -7, yes. But, I can state with complete confidence that in this particular case he's done the necessary checking and has 100% of the info needed to make a fully-informed and -aware decision for his RV-6 build.

Nice work, T. Looking great! You're going to finish before me! And I need some new fuel lines bent...

[Tdeman]

Originally Posted by JSOliveira

Progress looks great.

Check with Vans on the advisability of the small rudder. My understanding is that when test flying for spin recovery, the 7 would not reliably recover from a spin with the small rudder. Certainly not as fast as they wanted it too.

Thanks!

One thing to note, is this is actually an RV-6. (Never figured out a good way to change the thread title after the project changed directions.) There are probably more examples of this rudder flying on this airplane than any other experimental aircraft out there (until those 7 builders catch up!) I don't plan to spin the aircraft intentionally.

After a few years of flying when/if I decide to go to a constant speed prop, I'll likely throw on the -8 rudder and VS. Until then, I'll enjoy the reduced weight that far aft, and the 5 knots higher cruise speed from the small rudder

[Mark33]

Originally Posted by Tdeman

Thanks!

One thing to note, is this is actually an RV-6. (Never figured out a good way to change the thread title after the project changed directions.) There are probably more examples of this rudder flying on this airplane than any other experimental aircraft out there (until those 7 builders catch up!) I don't plan to spin the aircraft intentionally.

After a few years of flying when/if I decide to go to a constant speed prop, I'll likely throw on the -8 rudder and VS. Until then, I'll enjoy the reduced weight that far aft, and the 5 knots higher cruise speed from the small rudder

I was wondering the same thing.... is this a -6 or a -7 project? Like you said, there’s a lot of short tails (basically RV-4 tails) flying on -6’s out there. I’m building a -7, however, I’m installing an 8 rudder.

I’ve read up on why Vans decided use the 9 rudder on the 7, but there sure are a lot of 6’s out there that appear to be flying just fine with -4 rudders. So this brings me to the question....are there any real (enough) differences in the 6 and 7 that would require/compel a person to build a 7 with the larger VS/rudder?

I understand that the larger flight surfaces will give you greater authority,...but how much more? There’s a huge difference in the size of a 6 (4) VS/rudder and a 7 (9) rudder. So, even though Van’s elected to go with the 9 rudder on the 7’s,....and I’m sure for good reason, I feel pretty confident that an 8 rudder will work just fine on my 7, especially with so many 4 VS/rudder’s flying just fine on 6’s.

It’ll be interesting to see how your short VS/rudder works out on your project...but I’m sure it’ll work out just fine.

[AndyRV7]

Great build thread!

[JSOliveira]

Sorry, I did not realize it was a 6 - keep moving ahead.

John