| October 1 |
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Another month down. As I enter October I'm pretty pleased
with my progress so far. The cash flow for the project hasn't quite kept
pace with my progress, but that should even out over the next few months since
I've bought enough material to keep me busy for a while.
For the first day of the month I worked some more on cutting out and drilling
the remaining rib blanks. Here are a few of the pieces I cut today. |
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Sunday was a rainy day. By mid afternoon I was ready to go
shopping for a new tool. I've been wanting a new band saw for a while
now. I just hadn't been able to find one that would do the job. I've
seen people recommend the harbor freight version, but I just don't trust their
tool quality enough to buy one sight unseen.
With that in mind I went around locally to see what could be had. What
I ended up with was this Sears model 12" band saw. It has two speeds
(1400/3000) controlled by gear ratios not by slowing down the motor. It's
got a large, stable cast iron table. for 259.00 I think I made out OK.
I still need to purchase a few good blades for it, but I think the machine
itself should serve me well. |
| October 2 |
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hmmmm, I think I may have bought my band saw in
haste. I didn't realize just how slow I would need to turn the blade to
cut the steel tubing. Apparently the feed rate should be ~9- 11 times
slower than what this saw is capable of. I should be able to get
away with using this saw on some aluminum and just about all wood projects, but
it just won't work with the tube steel. Now I have a dilemma. Do I
return the saw and purchase another one specifically for the tubing? Do I
keep this one and modify it? Or, do I keep it and use it for it's intended
purpose and purchase a separate saw just for the tubing? Truth be told, I
don't really have the funds for the third option even though it is the most
appealing. I'm going to have to sleep on this one for another day or
two before I make my final decision.
As for today's progress: I routed all of the flap rib blanks
today. I ended up using the same form block that I used for the back
ribs. Once they are routed I will cut them all to their proper length in a
separate process. I'll use this method when I route the aileron ribs too. |
| October 3-4 |
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What did I do last night? Yup, more
routing. I finished routing the aileron blanks. I've got the 4
center short ribs left to go before I've cut all of the ribs out.
Once that is done, I only have to shape drill and flange 8 center ribs, 4
short ribs, 18 flap ribs, 26 flap nose ribs, 16 aileron ribs,16 aileron nose
ribs,16 aileron pocket ribs.
only . . . lol |
| October 5 |
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Looks like I'm going to be back tracking some.
I screwed up the placement of the pilot holes for the aileron blanks. I
guess I have plenty of spare .025 for stiffener stock now eh? |
| October 6-9 |
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Columbus Day weekend. I got pretty much
nothing to show for it. No excuses. I cleaned up a bit each
night, and organized some. But nothing resembling progress actually
happened.
Things were just too busy on the farm.
I think I worked something like 35 hrs this weekend. Maybe tonight I'll
actually get some work done |
| October 10 |
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I'm lost. That's about the only way to put
it. I'll get found in due time, but for now I'm just kind of
floundering.
Last night I went out with the intent of cutting the new and improved form
blocks with my new measurements. Once out there I double and triple
checked the measurements. My marks were all over the friggin
map. After about an hour of marking and erasing. I called the
night done. I wasn't going to make one more cut until I was 100% positive
that the cut was correct.
I don't want to get analysis paralysis, but I'm a bit gun shy right now. |
| October 11-12 |
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My thanks to all that have written me with
encouragement or a b-slap up side the head. Both were needed :)
I took another look at my numbers last night. I think I've got a handle
on it now. Onward |
| October 13-15 |
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Two weeks left in the farm season. Then I'm
hoping to have the free time and energy to actually get something done.
It's funny, I actually feel guilty that I haven't made much progress.
I did get out there Friday. I spent the last part of the evening
sitting at the bench looking at the plans. It was 11:00 or so but I wanted
to at least try to get something done. Honestly it wasn't worth the
effort. I was too beat to make any meaningful progress. I packed it
in before I did any damage. |
| October 16 |
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I opted out of shooting practice last night. I
needed to spend some time out in the workshop. I stuck with simple tasks
:). I deburred the aileron pocket ribs and the .032 center ribs.
Nothing huge, but it was forward progress. I used the 6" scotchbrite
wheel for the straight and slight curves and a 1" wheel chucked up into the
drill press for the tighter arcs. |
| October 17-22 |
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If you've been following along I apologize for the
lack of updates.
I got some work done in the last week. Not much but some. I
prepared the pocket rib form block for rib flange bending. The preparation
included cutting off the tabs and routing a radius on the edges.
Then I started by bending up one rib to see how it looked. Nice.
It matched the drawing. Then I read Wayne
Massey's trouble with the pocket ribs not matching up with the spar.
Now I'm wondering if I should hold off on finishing the rest until I have the
spar bent up. That way I could form it to match.
One more week and the farm will be closed. I expect to be back in full
swing by mid November. Maybe even sooner. |
| October 23-24 |
|
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Actual progress! I measured my backrib against
one bent up pocket rib, and sure enough it was short a bit. Instead of
adding a spacer, I've decided that I will wait until the spar is bent, get an
actual measurement, build up the formblock, and bend the bottom tab to the
proper size. With that said I bent all of the remaining pocket ribs with
the exception of the bottom tab. |
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Next up were the aileron nose ribs I spent
last night and even some time this morning cutting the tabs out of the
blanks. |
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Once I had all of the tabs cut, I bent one up before
I headed off to work. Here's a picture showing the comparison between the
blank and the bent nose rib. |
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Oh yeah. I've got a new helper in the shop now
too. His name is Zack. Ben, his 10 year old "big brother is
training him well |
| October 25-29 |
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Another long stretch between updates,
sorry. |
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I started (and finished) cutting and flanging all of
the aileron and flap nose and pocket ribs this weekend. Saturday was a
complete wash out on the farm, so I was able to spend a sizeable chunk of time
in the garage. Of course my two helpers helped me pass the time. :)
This picture shows the pile I was able to create. |
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This is a couple of pictures of a aileron nose rib
after it was routed and just before I hammered the flange |
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And another picture of the same piece after I had
hammered the tabs over and was doing a bit of finish filing before deburring |
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One more of the same piece. In this one you
can see the flange has been hammered down |
| October 30-31 |
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I had to make one of the flap nose ribs by
hand. I had miscounted and bent 14 for one side and only twelve for the
other. It was really a simple matter to just cut one with the snips.
The one on the left was hand cut, the one on the right was cut with the router. |
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On Halloween eve I spent a bit of time cleaning and
got ready to finish bending the .032 center ribs.
With October coming to a close I'm just about at the six month mark of my
project. I fell down a few times in Sept and Oct, but overall I'm pleased
with my rate of progress. |
| back, next |
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