Top coat on the upper ailerons, throttle panel and wobble pump lever

Today. I spent some time prepping the upper ailerons for top coat. I started by cleaning them of all the dust over the last 8 months of sitting around and then I sanded them and scotch-brited them. I also wanted to get some paint on the throttle panel and wobble pump lever so I loaded them into the booth as well. I mixed up paint and shot them to a nice pretty white.

Time spent today 4 hours
Total time spent 1272 hours

Finish filling the upper right aileron

Roll up post again on the coats of filler for the upper right aileron. So using the scotch-brite technique works really well especially if you attach it to a jitter bug sander. The only problem is that if you have a few bumps or places that need to be leveled you still need to have the sand paper around. What I found is that if you lightly sand all the bays just to level things out and then follow with the scotch brite you will get a great finish.

Time spent 4.5 hours
Total time spent 724 hours

Upper right and upper left coats and call to stewart systems for some help

After I got done with the upper right ailerons 3rd sprayed cross coat and it still required sanding I thought how much work this was going to to be to do the wings and everything else. I knew my fingers just wouldn’t take the rest if it was going to take this kind of time. So I called Stewarts to see if I was doing something wrong. Dan Stewart answered and I told him my issues he said first off the ailerons are the worst part of the whole plane to cover and finish. So that part was good news. Also he said since the videos have be out and the manual too that they have some new variations to the technique that may help. He asked what gun I was using and I told him the Devilbiss Finish line 3. The next question was how much pressure I can get to the gun I and I said 25 psi no prob he then asked which tip. I said 1.5 mm using 20 psi. He told me to try 1.3 mm at 23-24 psi will help some. To solve my 1 hour to sand each aileron he told me to try sanding down with red scotch-brite pads and even using an air sander when I get to the wings in the bays away from structure. He told me it should only take about 15 min to sand an entire wing and only a few minutes to sand the aileron. He also told me to try this about 30-45 min after each cross coat.

So I had some red scotch-brite went straight down stairs to try it and holy shit this technique worked awesome. The scotch brite really smoothed out the filler quick and it makes sanding around the rib stitches way easier on the upper right aileron which was through its 3rd cross spray coat. I decided to see how this works on the upper left aileron since it was still at a brush coat and I could try it on each spray coat. So far I am pretty excited on how much easier it is. After that was scotch-brited down I sprayed the upper right for 1 cross coat and the first cross coat of the upper left. About 30 min later I was able to use the scotch-brite and it smoothed right out. So that along with the tip change really really helped. Dan did say that they are in the process of putting out a new website with a forum and also a new video on this technique to the Eko Fill so the rest of the world can have this process.

Time spent 3 hours
Total time spent 719.5 hours

Finishing tapes on the upper right aileron and tip cap fabric

Well today I got back off my short week long summer vacation to the beach and got right back down to the basement to finish taping my upper right aileron.  If you remember from the previous post I had only taped the ribs but still needed to tape the spars, the trailing edge and the bottom side ribs.  After I had all those taped and drying I decided to get the tip cap fabric installed which is a PITA (pain in the ass) You have to do quite a bit of shrinking the fabric to get it to make the shape and even to that end I had to make a small slit to make it around the nose in nice shape.  I finished those on the other ailerons as well.  Its almost time for some eko fill!

The picture below is an example of the tip caps I was talking about, and yes I have a little trimming to do on the trailing edge.

 

Time spent today 5 hours

Total time spent 699 hours

Rib stitching and taping the upper right aileron

Today I got down the basement and immediately cut all the re-enforcing tape and started rib stitching.  I’ve the stitching down pretty good but after about 2 ribs I needed to put anti-chafe tape on my fingers.  I imagine that the wings are going to be quite fun with all those stitches.  After that was done I measured and cut all the rib tapes and started gluing the top surface in place.

Time spent today 3 hrs

Total time spent 692 hrs

Covering the upper right aileron

Tonight I got down to the basement and immediately started in on the upper right aileron. I started by a general cleaning with some alcohol to get the dust and prints off of it. I think anti-chafe taped the ribs, spars and trailing edges. After that was all done I cut a piece of fabric off my big roll and set it aside while I glued the surfaces that I want the fabric to stick too. After a while I had the fabric all glued on and brought up to the 350 deg temp. The last things I did was mark the tape locations and install the rib re-reinforcing tape and pre-punch the rib stitch holes.

Time spent 4.5 hours
Total time spent 689 hours

Finish taping the upper left aileron

Tonight I installed the finish tapes on the ribs, trailing leading edge sweep and top and bottom spars. While I was waiting for some glue to dry I started anti-chafe taping the lower right aileron

Time spent tonight 3 hours
Total time spent 678 hours

Rib stitching the upper left aileron

Tonight I spent my time rib stitching. First thing first I had to measure and mark straight lines that intersect the ribs. Once that was done I pre-punched the stitch holes with a pencil and then added the reinforcing strips. My wife wanted to learn how to rib stitch so I spent some time with her showing her how but she was too tired take on a rib by herself so I ended up back downstairs and finished the stitches.

Time spent 2.5 hours
Total time spent 675 hours

Finish tapes on lower left aileron covering the upper left aileron

Today I started off by finishing the upper side spar tape on the lower left aileron and then I also taped the trailing edge. All I have left on this aileron is to install the tip tapes to close everything off.

I set that aileron aside and start the upper left aileron by generally cleaning the dust and finger prints off the the aileron with some alcohol in a spray bottle with a rag. I then started taping on the anti-chaff tape on the ribs, spars and trailing edges. After that I glued on the piece fabric that I had cut a week ago it looks as though I can get three ailerons out of one 2 yrd X 2 yrd piece of fabric.

Time spent tonight 3.5 hours
Total time spent 672.5 hours

Gluing the lower wing tips and more and more filling

Today I glued the lower wing tips and also did copious small fill jobs mostly just filling the imperfections in the aileron tips and sanding off the areas that I already filled. Anyhow I did this for quite some time today but I can officially say that the ailerons are ready for cover and the upper wings are ready for clear coat. Once the lower wing tips cure and I can fill the transitions between the leading edges and the fiberglass those will be ready for the clear coat as well. One step closer to to covering.

Time spent today 5 hours
Total time spent 649 hours