Paint and More Final
Aircraft Assembly
Now that all of the
fitting has been competed on the fuselage and wings, it was time to
take the fuselage in for
paint. We used IMRON Candy Apple on
the top and an IMRON
Cream White on the
bottom with a Silver separator stripe between the two colors. After
getting it back from the
paint shop, we installed 1/8” thick urethane sealant around the
windshield and canopy as
an air seal and as a paint protector for the fairing skit leading
edges. That way, the rain and dust does not erode
the paint on these edges.
This next photo shows
the painted canopy with urethane window sealant:
And, here are the
painted results of the cowlings and other fiberglass parts. All of that fiberglass
preparation work really
paid off in the fished parts! Also,
this is why a professional paint shop is
the way to go in our
opinion.
As shown here, the
painter was careful to not get paint inside of the cowling hinges!
We now have a tail
sprouting from our fuselage. We did
make a small adjustment to the
Rudder connect rod-end
bearings in order to maintain the 1/8” spacing between the Rudder
Counterbalance Arm and
Vertical Stabilizer Tip due additional paint thickness. In addition,
we removed material from
the right Counterbalance in order to achieve balanced Elevators.
Remember this must be
done after painting because paint adds weight to the Elevators.
Once the tail controls
were connected, we moved on to the big job of installing the wings.
Again, we used our
lifting platform and engine hoist in order to make the lifting and Main
Spar hole alignment
simple (see wing fit for pictures).
Wow, we have an airplane Bubba!
This photo shows the
Main Spar wing connections and close tolerance bolts. The Holes must
be clean, hole alignment
good and drift pins in place. After the
shanks are greased, the bolts
are slowly tapped into
place using a wood block and hammer.
After the Main Spars bolts were
torqued down, then the
Forward and Rear Wing Connects were then bolted and safety/cotter
pinned into place. In the RV “A” models, there is just not
enough room for a conventional
open-end wrench for the
lower two outboard wing nuts. However,
a crows foot attachment
and socket worked
nicely.
Now that the wings are
on, the panel comes next. Without the
panel in, we had the necessary
room needed to gain
access to the Main Spar nuts and bolts.
The panel installation was simple
since gold connectors
were used on everything but the main battery and alternator wires.
