Rethinking the pitot mast fit - 8 hours

After some time off from the plane building with so much other stuff going on. These last few days, I'm feeling like I need to jump back into it. Ive really been thinking about how to mount the pitot mast and support it. After all the test fitting that I have done, I realized that it is not going to work to line up the support bracket with the rivets in the wing rib. It's either too close of too far away. I will have to abandon my original method (sorta) and head in a direction similar to what JRichichi @ Vans Airforce has posted about the method he used to mount his SafeAir1 pitot mast. The difference being that I want to rivet the support brace to the wing for the entire span.

I wanted to form the support brace (bracket). Looking at the methods shown by the "Sportplane Construction Techniques" Book by Tony Bingelis. I can easily make a form out of oak and used them as bending blocks to form the aluminum. So, I when to work making the oak blocks. Then, using 0.025" material. I began to make by first bend.



It came out really nice.

Next piece that I need to bend is another angle support bracket for the pitot mast itself. This bracket gets riveted to the pitot mast, and screwed to the support brace. The idea is that if you ever need to remove the mast for some reason. Three rivets that hold the mast at the spar get drilled out, and two screws accessible from behind get removed and the mast will be able to be removed, without much hassle. To make the pitot mast support. I chose 0.032" material. Bit thicker.

Once it was bent, I cut it to clear the welds on the back side of the mast.


I then fit the assembly to the wing.