Well, almost. Cleaveland bundled in a free practice kit in the form of a small aluminum phone/tablet holder that requires drilling, deburring, dimpling, and riveting to be assembled, not unlike the airplane kit that's sitting beside me. The aluminum pieces were covered in the same blue wrapping as the Van's parts, and just enough rivets were included to put it together. It was a fun little project that resulted in a functional phone stand that I'll actually be able to use to prop up my phone while I'm working.
Having had some practice with my new tools and with nothing else to stand in my way, it was time to finally take the first step. The journey begins with two parts – the HS-609PP rear spar doublers. These are just a couple pieces of aluminum that need to be prepared to be mounted to the rear spars.
The first task to be completed is "breaking" the edges of each piece by rounding them with a file. The corner on each edge is just enough that the doublers won't sit flat inside the spar channels, so about a 1/32" radius of material needs to be shaved off each corner so they'll sit flush with rear spar. I started by using the file to remove material and the Scotchbrite wheel to remove the file marks, but I quickly realized after multiple passes on a single edge that I just wasn't removing enough material. I fixed this by using the full length of the file (basic tool technique, I know) and pressing a bit harder to remove more material in the initial pass, then using the Scotchbrite wheel to clean up the edges and remove small amounts of material as needed to make the doublers sit flat. After a while, everything fit into place nicely.
The next step was to round the tips of each doubler to a 1/4" radius. I did this by measuring the radius and making the outline with a sharpie, then grinding away the material using the Scotchbrite wheel. This gave me very clean, polished ends on each doubler. Man, this Scotchbrite stuff is amazing!
 |
| The end result vs. the stock part. |
 |
| Marked. |
 |
| Almost there. I rounded both parts a tiny bit more before calling them done. |
I then took a red Scotchbrite pad and sanded the doublers to a "400-grit sandpaper" finish as specified by the plans. This removed the gunk from the stick-on part labels from Van's and also removed the stamped ink labels identifying the stock, leaving a very nice brushed aluminum finish. A quick pass with the Scotchbrite wheel on the edges to remove any tool marks and scratches and the doublers were finally done and looking great. Have I mentioned how much I love these Scotchbrite things?
 |
| Stock part on the left, sanded part on the right. The amount of light reflected really shows the amount of polish that the Scotchbrite pad left on the sanded part. |
Using the reamer I final drilled each hole in the assembly to #30, then I clecoed on the elevator hinge brackets so I could final drill those too. You may notice that the clecos changed from silver to copper; the silver clecos wouldn't stay in place after the holes were enlarged, so I went to the next size up. I made sure to label and number each piece to make sure they get put together the same way after I inevitably have to disassemble them for deburring and priming.
 |
| I ended up using the drill bit to match drill these brackets. With the top holes clecoed, the bottom holes were 98% aligned but were off juuuust enough that the reamer couldn't handle it. |
The pieces for the center hinge bearing mount needed to be clamped together and clecoed onto the spar to be match drilled. I had to remove a bunch of clecos just to get at one of the holes I needed to drill, so I drilled two of the six holes I needed to drill, clecoed them, then drilled the rest of the holes with the piece off of the spar. The results were good, but the brackets weren't completely level with each other since the HS-411APP and HS-411BPP weren't exactly mirrored parts. This is a pretty common and minor issue from what I've read and the parts still sit on the spar just fine, so I won't worry about it too much.
I'll need to prime the VA-146 bearing, but that can wait until I have some primer to do it with. I set the rear spar assembly aside and began work on the front spar. First, the HS-00001 doublers needed to be separated. A quick run of the band saw followed by some grinding with the Scotchbrite wheel yielded two clean pieces.
I took out the front spars and started working on what would be the first major mistake I made in this project. To start, I clecoed the HS-710 and HS-714 reinforcement angles to the HS-702 front spars to join them. The plans then call for the HS-702 pieces to be trimmed to match the drawing so that they have a 6 degree bend and relief notches to prevent cracking along the bend.
My screw-up? I jumped straight to the notch-making and completely skipped the first step. That is, I skipped the very first step that says I was supposed to trim the spar flanges to 5 3/16" from the end before marking the bend line and cutting out the notches. I didn't realize it until after finishing the notches and making the 6 degree bends. The plans say to match drill the HS-00001 doublers with the spar, but the measurements in the plans weren't matching up with my measurements of the parts. I scratched my head, remeasured the parts, and searched the forums for answers, but it wasn't until I looked back at the plans that I noticed the ghost cut-out of the flange that I should have cut by now.
 |
| Apparently I briefly forgot that Step 1 is supposed to be done before Step 2. |
The notches I made weren't bad and the bends were just about perfect, but they were in the wrong spot. One order of replacement parts from Van's later and the total price of my mistake ended being 2 hours and $70. I was pretty upset at first, so I decided against trying to build while angry and called it a night.
 |
| Cutting these notches was good practice at least... |
The nice thing about these kits is that there's always something else I can be working on, so I'll start work on the vertical stabilizer while I'm waiting on my new HS spars to be shipped.
