Friday, January 12, 2007
F-449
I installed the F-449 bracket today. In fact I made up two of them, one per the plans, and the second one shown here. It locates the bearing, supporting the control column, 5/16th further forward. This appears to be preferential since it causes the aileron push rods to line up with the push rod hole in the side of the fuselage and wing rib. The standard bracket moves them 5/16th aft causing considerable filing to gain clearance for the push rod. I see very little downside. The only significant change is that the base of both sticks moves forward the same distance but I can not see why this might matter.
I will not drill the 3/32 bolt holes, that locate the rear control column support, or finalise the length of the push rod connecting the two sticks, until the ailerons have been installed, and no snag has been found.
Labels: controls
Thursday, January 11, 2007
Installing the Wings
This turned out to be a very easy task. We had expected it take the whole day. With a little grease on the bolts, and a very light wooden mallet, the whole job took less than 75 minutes without any swearing.
The only slight hang up was getting the rear spar to fit between the two 'ears' in the side of the fuselage. 
It is unclear quite how many bolts you need to safely support the wings. We took the decision to install 4 AN6 bolts into each wing root, together with one of the AN3 and AN4 bolts on each side, to take the weight.
While waiting for help with the wings, I had started to look at the canopy frame. I think it will be several months until I return to this task, since installation of the wings makes possible so many tasks that need to be done.
The canopy work will be much more easily undertaken when the wings are back off.
The wing installation continues under the the 'wings' section of this blog.
The only slight hang up was getting the rear spar to fit between the two 'ears' in the side of the fuselage. 
It is unclear quite how many bolts you need to safely support the wings. We took the decision to install 4 AN6 bolts into each wing root, together with one of the AN3 and AN4 bolts on each side, to take the weight.
While waiting for help with the wings, I had started to look at the canopy frame. I think it will be several months until I return to this task, since installation of the wings makes possible so many tasks that need to be done.
The canopy work will be much more easily undertaken when the wings are back off.
The wing installation continues under the the 'wings' section of this blog.
Labels: wings fuselage
