The first activity here was the disassembly of the old, trusty table and the building of more jigs. Couldn’t help feeling the jigs were an overkill from the structural strength perspective. But one, I placed the fuselage into it and then two, placed my 225 lb. carcass into it as well. I felt it was perhaps worth the effort. Regarding the leveling of the fuselage, there is only one method that really works. The manual suggests three…

1. Transit. Unless you stand 100 yards away, I couldn’t get the one I had borrowed to focus. Also, 100 yards introduces too much error.
2. Laser level. I forked out around $100 for one. The problem here was repeatability. I’d level the fuselage and go back and find an error. It turned out that the bubble is not sensitive enough to ensure 1/8" accuracy over 20’.
3. Ye olde water level from the Egyptians. Worked like a champ. Consistent results, cheap and easy (hard to believe that something in this project is actually cheap and effective--but there you have it! At last a savings! Naturally, this doesn't count since, I had originally had been so pleased at saving $50, and now after overspending $100 on the laser level--my budget is still showing a loss).

The Jigs (Clamps are temporary) and the aft fuselage Jig

I then Bondo’ed two string levels onto the web at the firewall. This allows me to see if anything has moved when inserting wings and things.

Also couldn’t wait to get a wing into the fuselage. With the help of "the infamous Cal" (Dylan’s words) we got a glimpse of the plane starting to sprout feathers.

The "Infamous" Cal and I after fitting the wing.

The manual provides a suggested sequence of assembly, but since my assembly hall is a massive 20’ by 22’ I was confronted by a challenge. The manual suggested mounting the HS at this juncture. The thirteen plus feet span of the HS would have robbed me of four feet for the wing. Leighton suggested, I fit the wings first and then proceed onto the tail feathers. Made sense, so this is what I’m doing.

The first task was to add the BID tapes not done in the fast build. I also added a new hardpoint into the firewall for the IO550 engine mount. I have finally decided to upgrade the plane to a Super ES ( I am still not convinced that an airplane engine is worth $32 000). But I have a direction now and the new engine mount opens up other options like fitting a refurbished IO520, or even an O470 like the one in my beloved Skylane. But all this comes later.

IO550 Engine mount new hardpoint

The real work now begins with mounting the wing attach shear web. This is a pretty beefy structure with many, many layers of fiberglass, huge chunks of phenolic and massive brackets. Good stuff here!

As usual the blueprints serve as loose guidelines and the usual cut, fit, trim, fit, trim, fit, trim, sh__! routine works. Once the prepreg looked OK the placement of said prepreg was required. Sounded simple, insert wings, add a spacer on the forward face of the shear web bracket, fit bulkhead and micro in. As you may remember my assembly hall is somewhat limited in the space area. So the following procedure was used. Fit the right wing (cut hole for shear web bracket first), add ½" spacer, place bulkhead against spacer and estimate where the other end of the bulkhead will land up. Place a small fillet of micro/epoxy on both faces of the bulkhead for about 4--6 inches along the vertical side of the fuselage, only on the side where the wing is. Phone a friend (in this case Michael Hudson) with a truck. Haul the wing from the assembly hall to the hanger and bring the other wing back to the assembly hall. Then insert this wing, add spacer and fit the bulkhead. Now the bulkhead can be micro'ed in, using the shear web bracket plus spacer on the one side and the fillets on the other. This worked well. Once, the micro has cured the hardpoints are cut out of phenolic and fitted. Then the seat rail mount is manufactured and fitted. Now lots and lots o' fiberglass is laid.

Shear web bracket hardpoints and lots 'n lots o' fiberglass

The next thing was to drill two little holes for locating the brackets that get bolted to the bulkheads. These holes, as small as they are, are pretty critical to setting the angle of incidence of the wings. The only way, that I could come up with to ensure everything is set up correctly was to insert both wings. Another phone call to Michael to secure the use of his truck, his, and his son, Ed's, time. In addition, to transporting the wing to the assembly hall, the fuselage had to be moved out onto the driveway and both wings had to be fitted. I reined in Cal and his help. All in all, it took the entire day to drill the two holes.

That is quite some wing span!

Michael checks the incidence angle before I drill.

Cal supervises while I work (Cal remarked that this is what a "fast build" should arrive from the factory looking like)

Starting to look like an airplane

Right bracket and the left bracket, bolt side

Left bracket and wing bracket.

The brackets finally get mounted and now the forward seat support web. This is pretty straight forward, as much of the work is the easy parts of the wing mount bulkhead. The pictures show the fitted prepreg and the completed bulkhead

After a long hiatus, which included my daughter’s wedding and various visitors invading our little home/aerospace facility, I re-awoke and redoubled my efforts in turning liquids to solids and finally to dust. As it turns out this web site has allowed me to meet various people over the Internet and exchange ideas and give advice (which I strongly recommend no-one follows, kinda like the "Not For Navigational Use" disclaimer on charts). An email sent to me by Henry Bartle started a friendship which has been a boon to Dylan, me and the project. Henry comes over at least once a week on Tuesday evening and joins Larry and me in a "build fest" until around 9:00PM (invariable turns out to be 10:00 or later) after which we review our blunders over a beer and sandwich at our local. This little tradition has turned out to be much fun. Thanks Henry!

Henry striking a pose in his "Plane building outfit".

After the completion of the forward seat bulkheads and caps, hardpoints for the Navaid Devices, Inc. wing leveling autopilot were inserted.

Another frustrating experience was the wingtip. It turned out that the tips that were shipped with the kit were "the old ones". With no hassle Lancair sent "the new ones". The most outstanding difference is the flash guard for the strobe and they were supposed to fit better than the old ones. The joggle on the upper surface of the wing was not parallel to the bottom one, I immediately looked for where I could have screwed up, but it is impossible that this was due to my ineptitude. After much sanding and cursing we mounted the tip against the joggle as best we could, we then filled in the remaining gap with micro and did a reasonable job of the fit. One of the disappointments was that the tip’s lens and the tip itself are very poorly faired.

The next challenge was to get the joystick to pivot freely in the pitch direction, again the aileron torque tubes were… you guessed it "the old ones" but I could remedy the problem by shaving off some of the height from the delrin washer. By inserting a small piece of 11/4" pipe and putting in the drill press, I could sand it down nicely.

These shots show a close-up of the left aileron bell crank and its mounting, the joystick, aileron torque tube and its mount.

A little more correction was required with the rudder pedal mounts. The tubes are mounted in three places, left, right and center. The center mount landed up further back than was expected. I re-measured the distance from the firewall, which is the reference given in the manual, but the mount is about 3/8" too far back. So I am constructing a hard point out of flox.

General view of some of the hardware going in. It turns out I need not have cut out all of the way for the elevator push rod, so a little repair work is required.

Here is a close-up of the elevator torque tube connecting to the push rod that goes further aft. The flap motor mount is visible below the turque tube.