Don't read the last chapter.
From Old Yeller to Marley & Me, they're all the same. They end in tears.
Remember that. There's a reason I mention it.
The night started out with 17 nutplates, but they went quickly since they were going on the other side of countersunk holes. That means they didn't need to be dimpled. Thirteen of them were aligned along an edge, so it would be easy to get at the rivets with the squeezer. The other four used blind rivets. That used to be good news, but I've been having trouble with the butter-soft blind rivets breaking off in the puller.
So, the easy thirteen first:
Then the four with the finicky blind rivets, approached with a gentle touch and increased diligence in keeping any side angle off of the rivet puller.
Only one stand-out. Could have been worse.
The last step before mounting the bulkhead onto the rest of the fuselage center assembly was the mounting of a couple of doublers. That involved a relatively large collection of LP4-3 blind rivets and AN470 4-4s that I'd have to squeeze. The -4s were, as always, a good workout.
That was enough for the night, but I couldn't resist doing the next step which was to finally cleco the bulkhead to the front of the fuselage section in preparation for riveting. I carefully flagged all of the holes that were to remain open.
As I was taking a final look at the plans to make sure that I had all of the correct holes flagged, something caught my eye. See if you can tell what it was:
Did you get it? Did you see that the doublers that I riveted in are on the wrong side of the bulkhead?
Do you remember that stuff about sad endings?
Yeah, it's like that.
Drilling those rivets out is going to be an onerous chore, and I'm also going to have to order a new bag of them as I won't have enough to replace them with the few that I have left.
There is some very, very slight chance that I could leave those doublers where they are, but I'd have to call Van's and ask. I'm sure Van's has heard just about every sad tale of builder's mistakes under the sun by now, but this one is bound to go to the top of their "How in the world could anyone do that??" list. I can't decide whether I want to suffer the embarrassment on the very slim chance that it doesn't make any difference where those doublers are.
Poor, poor Old Yeller.
1 comment:
Just a doubler that you still have access to! I have one on wing spar that I installed wrong. I found it out after I finished wing and was rigging aileron and flap. Ended drilling out a hundred rivets and reaching in through access plates and wing rib openings and using long buckling bars to fix the problem. I was thankful that I did not have to drill out the entire wing skins. How do you compare your mistake with mine!
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