rear deck queries

sorry for the new thread, but missed catching vans tech support before closing, so here I am with what I hope to be a simple question. The rear deck, f-714 (dwg-26), the build manual, which I sure wish I had as a searchable pdf file, but anyway, says on page 8-10 "after deburring. etc, rivet aft deck to the fuselage". So doe this mean just to the longerons, but the cross pieces underneath, (see dwg 27a) f-710b and f-711d both have spacers on top of them to fill the gap between the cross pieces and the rear deck, but I cannot find mention of these spacers, install now, or does this come later when the horizontal stabilizer is installed ? which means attaching the rear deck is just to the longerons and not to the cross pieces?

I believe the answer you are looking for is located at the end of chapter 8, Fitting the Empennage. The H-710B angle should already be riveted to the F-710 bulkhead. Those are all drilled at that time.

DWG 27A says to backdrill the spacers to the aft deck, and there's a rivet call-out of AN470s deck-spacer-angle. Look at DWG 27A carefully.

BTW, you have to make those spacers. DWG 27A upper left corner.

Just rivet to longerons for now. You will make the spacers later when you are preparing to mount the horizontal stabilizer.

Very good, I appreciate all the replies, so rivet to longerons right now and get to more reading in the manual. Seems building this plane is mostly reading and head scratching ?

MeAndMyToys said:

Just rivet to longerons for now. You will make the spacers later when you are preparing to mount the horizontal stabilizer.

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I think you're talking about two different spacers. There are two spacers that go *under* the deck (one forward, the F710C, and one aft which also acts as the elevator stop, F711E) and two that go *on top* of the deck (F798 shims).

I think the OP is talking about the F710C and F711E spacers, and IIRC, they get riveted in while you're riveting on the deck. The rivet callouts are on the drawing, AN470AD4-8s, etc.

It would be needlessly complicated to get these inserted between riveted deck and longerons after the fact and then rivet them in.

When I did my rear deck I made all the spacers and riveted everything. Very Important! Be sure to level your fuse and double check that the rear deck is level as well before riveting. Otherwise your horizontal stabilizer will not be level

KitfoxJoe said:

When I did my rear deck I made all the spacers and riveted everything. Very Important! Be sure to level your fuse and double check that the rear deck is level as well before riveting. Otherwise your horizontal stabilizer will not be level

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Even with leveling and such, you can still end up needing a small shim under one side or the other (in addition to the shims called for in the plans) of the HS spar...I think mine was .016", maybe less, but we did need just a smidge to make the HS perfectly level and square to the fuse, etc.

RV7A Flyer said:

I think you're talking about two different spacers.

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I agree.

When the manual says rivet on the aft deck, it means with all parts associated to it. The spacer that goes under the deck, on the F-710 would be consider part of that process.