Initial Tank Fitting Right side - 3 hours

I started to cleco the right tank. The middle ribs are quite straight forward but I had a more difficult time with the end ribs. I used and awl to help align holes which worked great, but it was still very difficult on those end ribs. Not feeling good about the fit I un-clecod the ribs and soon found out that the tips of the ribs had dug into the skin making a good fit difficult. So I got out the dremmel with the 3M and worked on the tips...making sure that the striations that make up the tip where rounded. I also smoothed out the ridges in the skin and re-fit them. It was an easier go....Still a bit tough.....but easier.

I started running out of clecos (aghh) so I needed to steal them off of the left wing in order to keep going. I cleco'd the baffle in place and put a couple of clecos in on the baffle/end ribs where they would clear the z-brackets. I then set the assembly on the right wing.

The fit was pretty decent, but I noticed that the joint at the top of the leading edges was not. The tank wanted to set a little proud.


I noticed that the tank lines up very well on the bottom side, but there is a slight gap along the spar where the tank skin meets the top skin. I had anticipated needing to help push the tanks down onto the spar with straps as I have seen in so many other builds. I played with trying to wrap the straps around the wing, but the trick that I had to overcome was making sure I did not damage the top wing skin. It wasn't working well so I stopped for the night.