February 6, 2005 - Right Wing

Fortunately, I had previously prepped the right wing ribs along with the left wing ribs way back when. It doesn't bring back a lot of fond memories. Prepping consists of straightening the flanges to 90 degrees, sanding smooth all edges, and fluting.

Still, I spent another hour or two smoothing edges on these ribs, mostly around the corners. Then I rubbed them down with acetone and then with water, in preparation for priming. It was an unusually warm February day -- 50+ degrees -- which made priming easy.

Then I clecoed the structure back together. Then I realized the rear spar had to be off, so that I could rivet the ribs to the front spars.

You may have noticed that the innermost (710) rib is missing. That's because I mistakenly used it in the left wing! The 710 is a little thicker than the other 711 ribs, so I ordered another one from Vans for the right wing. The slightly thicker rib in the left wing won't hurt anything.

Initially, I tried riveting the ribs to the front spar by myself. Two ribs into it I gave up because I wasn't happy with the quality. I had to drill two of the rivets out. I called it a night. The next session I secured the front spar to the workbench and Lynnette manned the bucking bar while I shot the rivets. Much, much better. Because I could flex the rib to the side a little, I was able to use the straight set on the rivet gun. We finished the front spar in a few minutes and all the rivets came out great.

I was able to use the hand-squeezer on the rear spar, except for the bottom row. On these, I had to use the gun with the double-angle set, which I don't like to use, but in this case there was no alternative. The innermost rib had arrived from Van's, so I prepped it, and we riveted that to the structure as well.

The wing structure is now ready to hang on the jig.

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