Thinking day!

It's amazing how after a couple days, your mess up seems quite a bit less then what you thought at the time it happened! I looked at it yesterday morning and thought....it's not so bad. It should be fine.

I showed some guys at the EAA meeting last night about my conundrum and to my delight, each person had a warm smile. It's those moments that you learn....You learn a lot. First it tells you that everyone in that room has been there. It's a welcome to the club smile! Secondly - It's a smile that tells you 'Hey no worries, there's always a fix'. I tell you I felt like a million bucks after the EAA meeting. I've learned that's why you need to go to them.

Today I received an email from Sterling @ Van's giving his sage advice. Short and sweet - Upsize to AN4 and build on. The relief that I hadn't totally messed up was a bit short lived as I began to think my next move. First....order AN4 bolts, washers, and nutplates. Oh...which nutplate. I knew that K1000-4 was not going to work with the spacer. So now I have to think maybe a one lug, or a compact nutplate. Then...that led me to questioning edge distance on the parts. Oh man.
I should really figure out if edge distances play a factor on these parts.

Update: Called Vans to determine if edge distance was an issue. In short, they didn't think so but their answer was not definitive. It was a bit frustrating as the fella on the phone said I could leave the AN3 bolt with the slightly oblong hole. (But I have already drilled it out to AN4). Later in discussions with my friend who is an airplane mechanic would explain that edge distances are more critical with rivets than bolts due to the loads incurred when the are squeezed/bucked while bolts do not exert the same kind of pressures on the hole. He said that due to the nature of the part in tension that upsize to AN4 is alright for what I have done.




Build Tip - I've learned this so far. Think twice, act once. If you think once you will act 10 times more (worry yourself, and bug everyone around you). It's funny....I've not really messed up the hard parts (bending skins, bending tabs, double riveting the rudder trailing edge). I've just really messed up on the easy stuff. It's all because I've researched and thought about the tough stuff but paid no attention to the easy stuff. That's when it bites you.

Note to self - Remainder of build drill everything thicker than sheet aluminum in a drill press, or make a poor man's drill guide. That would have really saved my butt on this one.