So I have slowed progress a bit waiting on the rest of the wing kit from Raven which will come on the 16th hopefully. I have also been waiting to drill the 90 deg bell crank because of the proximity of the bolts to the drag wire when the bell crank is rotated. I was able to position the bell crank with a slight angle that allowed a bit more clearance and resulted in about 1/4″ of space between the bellcrank bolts and the drag wires. I also ground down the 90 deg bell crank 1/4″ down bolt tube down so that I could increase the gap some more. I then drilled two of the 4 mounting bolts on both wings. I am currently waiting for some more 1/4″ plywood to extend it about 1/2″ to accommodate the current location of the 90 deg bell crank.
After I got the bell crank set and drilled I decided to look into cutting the control tube pass through. Since I don’t have my control tubes yet I went down to lowes and bought 5/8″ diameter wooden dowels so I could mock up my control tubes. I used my aileron hinge bearings to screw into the dowel temporarily so I could bolt into the brackets. I marked the center of the tube on the compression rib and then 1/4″ away from the center line to avoid the compression strut inside the compression rib. I used a socket wrench that had a diameter of 1.125″ and marked my radius on both sides of the center line. I then drilled a bunch of holes and popped the blank out. I finished it using a small drum sander from my dremel tool attached to my drill (my dremel is under the weather)
Once I got the control pass through done I installed my mock control tubes and finally decided I had to reverse the last rib cross member (remember I installed the rib upside down as explained in previous post). I cut the cross member out with my coping saw and then I had to remove the gusset on one side of the new cross member so I could get the diagonal installed all the way into the joint. I just pulled the gusset off and the filed the remains back down to the 1/4″ sticks. I made a new cross member and glued it in then glued in the new gusset I made and nailed it in. All done.
Time spent 6 hours
Total time spent 94 hours
Pitts S-1SX 