Matt's RV-7 Project

I got the three good aileron brackets riveted to the rear spars without too many problems, although it did take some creative gymnastics to get the squeezer onto all the rivets. If you use the longeron yoke and a 4" no-hole yoke you can get all these rivets set without resorting to the bucking bar – as long as you're not picky about which side the shop head ends up on, since on some of the rivets, the squeezer can only be positioned one way.

Again notice the mix of flush and universal rivets, as called out by the plans:

Then I trimmed, deburred, and clecoed the flap braces in place. I still haven't quite figured out the strategy for attaching the flaps (i.e. what gets machine countersunk and what gets dimpled) so I'll just leave these guys clecoed in place until I get to that stage.

Then I started building the aileron pushrods. The long ones that connect the control sticks to the aileron bellcranks are made of 1.25" aluminum tubing, and the short ones that connect the bellcranks to the ailerons are made of small-diameter 4130 steel tube. My cheap cutoff saw came in handy to cut the tubes to the correct length:

After cleaning up the ends of the cut tubes, I sprayed copious amounts of aerosol primer down the insides until I could see that the innards were evenly coated. Then I also proceeded to prime the exterior surface of the aluminum pushrods – the steel ones are already powder-coated and don't need any further corrosion protection.

Here I've inserted the end cap thingies into the big pushrods and marked the locations for the rivets that hold them on. I'll wait until tomorrow to drill the holes, though, so the primer has a chance to fully cure (so I don't ding them up while working with them).

The plans also call for you to rivet end caps onto the steel pushrods as well, but they give you the option of welding them on too. I may try to find somebody to weld them up for me, since it seems like a welded pushrod end would have a smaller overall size, and thus require less enlargement of the exit hole in the rear spar.

I cut some wing-shaped chunks out of the wing rack, and Mary¹ took time out from studying² to help me lift the wings into their new home. Now we can get one of the cars³ into the garage.

Some foam pipe insulation I found laying around in the garage, along with some wadded-up foam, protects the leading edges. The spars on the root end sit in notches built into the rack. (photo here)

1. A saint.
2. Because she's a saint.
3. Yes, that's my car and not hers. I offered to park outside and let her stay in, but she wanted me to put the Toyota inside instead. I guess she knows I have to leave the house when it's pitch black. But I'll show her – I'll scrape her windshield and park hers inside to thaw out when I leave!

I banged together this cradle to hold the quickbuild wings, using some lumber I had laying around:

This end will get wing-shaped cutouts made in it, as soon as I have the actual wings here to measure from:

The spars will sit in the notches on this end:

Here's the basic idea, courtesy of the tiny drawing in the preview plans book:

Total out of pocket expenditure to build this: eight bucks, for the wheels and some screws.