February 4, 2007


After yesterday I was definitely having a more productive day.  Went to Home Depot for HVAC filters and looked around for something to put on the deck of the bandsaw.  I found a sheet of lexan for 2.50$ - perfect.

Here's the bandsaw before:



The sheet of lexan - its a bit narrower than the deck, but it'll do.



Drilling the lexan for the bandsaw blade in the middle.



I cut in to the hole in the center - now to figure out how to attach it.  Ideally I'd drill and tap it for countersunk machine screws, but I have a plane to build.  Packing tape it is :)



Making cuts in the channel prepping it for bending.  This has been filed and sanded.



Clamping the channel into the brake.  The 90 degree bend can't be fully made in the brake, but this will get the bend line started and straight.



I put the bend line under the clamp directly on the line on the brake.  I'm not sure what the scratch is, but I'll polish it out.



Bent as far as it can be.



The channel - probably about 20 degrees.  I've got a block of wood cut to finish the bend.



I cut slots in a block of 2x4 to use as a clamp on the brake.  Its not a perfect edge, but since the bend is already started it comes out just fine.



The block on top of the channel - I was thinking about putting some AL under it to help form a straighter line but decided against it.  It was to hard to line up straight.



Almost there - the brake can't make a 90 degree bend unless it can bend past it.  Use some seaming pliers to bend it to 90 degrees.




Here we go again - the two short ribs for the stabilizer.  Here's the blanks.



The ends marked for the 90 degree bend.  This is the "cut-to" line - the corners will be radiused.  I'm polishing the ends with 400grit sandpaper - makes it nice and smooth and removes all evidence of filing.



The edges cut off - still needs to be radiused and filed down.



After filing and bending.  They're upside down.



Here's the other end - the edges are already trimmed, filed and radiused.  The solid line is the bend line and the dashed line (on the left - I goofed on the right) is the cut line.



Pretend there are pictures here with cutting, filing and bending - I dunno why I didn't take shots of that.

Here's some of the kit included control surface ribs.  All of the orange highlighter on the parts list on the right is kit included parts.



And how I'm planning on polishing out the front and rear spars.  Its great they're included in the kit and I'm really glad I didn't have to make them, but the mill they're using to make them leaves some pretty deep scratches in the material.  This attachment was $5 at home depot.



I started by clamping the front spar to the bench.  It kinda worked - but it wasn't solid enough.



And they're done.  PFM.  I wish - I put the drill attachment on my drill press with some 220 grit on it.  Compared to spending a couple of hours last week trying to hand sand it, this 15~20 minutes was pure bliss.



Now to make the forward spar channel - its made from .032" channel.



The ends of the spar channel are a bit more detailed than the ribs - the radius is a bit bigger and the edge trims are bigger.  The blacked out corners are approximately the radius.



There isn't any particular order for cutting, bending and drilling the channel on the prints.  I had the channel sitting on the bandsaw when I decided it would be easier to drill the three pilot holes in the end before bending.  And here they are:



The edges cut with the bandsaw.  Still needs filing.



Filed.  The sanding removes some of the marker - thats what makes the line on the end not look straight.  The metal is.



The end bent and the rest of the pilot holes drilled - 10 in all.



A closer look of the bend and pilot holes.  After bending there were some scratches in the metal so I sanded it out.



I was having an issue trying to figure out how to judge where the spar channel attaches to the front spar.  There isn't any fixed measuring point.  Full size prints to the rescue.  I measured from the edge of the channel to the center of the rivet line.  The measurement shown here is WRONG!!!  



I went to mark the flange - "gee, that looks bigger than the drawing.  Hmmm..."  (those little lines on the ruler are 16ths)



By lining up the rivet line in the center of the three holes and the top of the spar and clamping it starts to come together.



If you look closely you can see the line centered in the pilot holes.  It doesn't look perfect, but that is the camera.  



See?  Pretty durn close.


If you look closely I've marked eight spots for pilot holes - I want to get it together with clecos before I mark all of the pilot holes.



Drilled and clecoed - now if I only had the other spar channel cut.  I couldn't resist assembling it.



A closeup of the joint.



< Last Home Next >