If you ever need to work with Pro Seal tank sealant, well… be prepared, be ready as this thing is so stick and makes all your tools and surroundings dirty as hell!
I did survived that 🙂 and my fuel tanks are almost ready! Still need to go through inspection and also still have to test them (no pressure test and pressure test).
On another note we had some local Halloween party for kids as well as some meeting with close friends.
Below is my report in pictures and also some videos about work done, enjoy!
The day has come and I started to work on my wing’s top skins riveting. This is definitely two person job, unless you use back riveting technic. My father was able to help me on this and it was a 10 hours journey.
Here we go – I was able to finish both of my wings spars. Good news! It took a while though because I was a bit busy with other work here plus we all got some sort of sore throat/flu. All this postponed my wing spars assembly by over a week time. Anyway now it is all done and below you may enjoy few pictures and video taken during this build. My next target is: Wing ribs!
Starting now I will be working on my wings assembly for my RV10 airplane. I already started to work on these and even completed one video about it. So far I can say that the work related to wings assembly is not that much different from the tailcone assembly process. However way more holes in wings thus more drilling/match drilling/etc will be required. Lets see and guess how long will it take me to complete this part of my airplane. My guess is about a year or so..
I decided to post not only pictures of my RV10 build here but also some pictures of the events happening around the time of build. That probably will make a good memories 🙂
I am glad to admit that my tailcone assembly has finally been completed. It took me 303 hours to get it to the state as it is now and will likely require additional 40-45 hours to finish it up after Canadian inspection is completed
This was long journey with number of issues and questions. Now it is all done and I am happy to move on to the next part: Wings assembly. Before that however I will need to finish my elevator’s trailing edges.
Two videos below are the final videos for the empenage build. It is officially done now!
These past three weeks were very busy. I went to USA, to Aurora, OR to visit Van’s Aircraft factory and pick up my wings for RV10. That was during COVID time, thus I took all required precautions to stay safe.
At the same time we finished construction of our kitchen at the hangar. We finally can seat all together with kids and have lunch while watching TV at our hangar.
Finally I started annual inspection of our Piper PA28-235. This is separate process and I do some videos about it aswell.
My tailcone gets ready. I already finished riveting and assembly of the aft deck. Now its time to rivet top skins and all should be finally done.
Here we go – I just started riveting of my tailcone parts all together. This year summer still not here. It is June 13th outside and still rainy. I can count how many CAVOK days I found in 2020 during April-June using my fingers on my hands. Anyway my Piper is now almost due for its annual. I heard that we may extend that by up to 15% time so I hope I can get my extended till July and slowly move it to September, October or even November cycle during next 1-2 years.
I spent two work days riveting my tailcone parts and riveting skins. While at my hangar I am getting shower installed I have no hot water. Anyway that was not a problem for my kids and wife to come and help me working on the tailcone. Today was a good working day. I riveted about 30% of skins. More to follow 🙂
It took me good amount of hours to prepare all tailcone parts. Most of the time was spent on matchdrilling and holes deburing followed by holes dimpling. So many holes….
At the end of the day I now have my tailcone parts all primed. Priming was another story. While priming parts I realized that I have not enough primer left to complete my tailcone skins. Attempts to source same SAM grey primer locally were unsuccessful because this primer is not available in Canada. Imagine, in USA it is available even at Home Depot. In Canada we only have two standard self etching primers: DupliColor and another brand. Both are only available in little rattle cans. I had no choice but to use two cans of this green color primer which I had left from vertical stabilizer assembly. Now I will have my tailcone inner skins (bottom and side) in green while all other parts in grey. This is not a problem from the quality perspective but little unusual ecstatically. Anyway I had no choice since due to COVID borders are now closed so I have no way of going to US to buy this primer nor order it (delivery times over 30 days on average now).
During tailcone parts preparation I had a chance to visit Victoria with my family on a airplane trip. It was cool adventure! The next step is Tofino.
I used to fly this beautiful airplane some time ago. It was my initial trainer to get in to PPL. Small, light two seater – Diamond DA-20 Katana A1 with Rotax 912 engine.
The funniest part of that engine was to check the oil. It was the process you had to follow including “gurgling” and prop spinning by hand.
Airplane was very light and each air movement was noticeable. With the same time it was slow (about 90 kt) in cruise and it was very forgivable. I think that as a trainer aircraft this model is very good!
Airplane is very economical. Rotax912 engine is modern model, it uses water cooling system so no shock cooling issues. Engine was STCd for automotive gasoline use and I remember my self bringing 20L can of Shell94 and flying at least 60-90 minutes on it. So it is about 3.5-4 Gallons per hour which is super economical.
Landing of Katana was another story – if you are little faster on approach you could float over runway and touchdown only in the middle. Airplane wants to fly. To land it you have to be at precise speed over the numbers and than gently flare and wait for touch down. With the same time glide characteristics of this airplane are amazing (14:1). From 2000ft AGL while practicing emergency landing I had so much time to find the spot and do all my business. Comparing to Cherokee 235 where from 3000 AGL it goes down like a brick with no prop spinning my Diamond was like a glider.
