Fitting the baggage bulkheads - 4 hours

 I was curious this last while about just how straight the fuse was. When working on the forward fuse and crawling in there doing all the building I've bumped the fuse a number of times. So I set up the laser level on the garage door to shoot a center line. Well...To my surprise and delight it was spot on, so its a piece of mind that I can forge ahead confidently. 

 Now I need to fit the baggage compartment bulkheads. I started in on fluting the curved section of the F-722 bulkheads and then the F- 723 bulkheads. Then I was ready to cleco them in place. 

 

First step I drew a reference line on the tab of the bulkhead that meets with the longeron. I'll need to start figuring out the correct placement of that rivet once I have the bulkhead removed. 

Next I had a good look at the flange/tab that is to mat with the F-623 rib. Lots of builders talk about a gap here and sure enough, I too have a gap but nothing that a 0.063" shim won't take care of.

Before I started to cut a shim, I marked the rivet holes from the bottom skin onto the flange of the bulkhead. Yup, same as many other builders I too have a questionable edge distance on the inboard rib. 

This snafu was in the back of my mind reading other build logs. So it was an easy decision for me to choose making a new flange rather than just use a shim. A new flange with solve both the shim and the edge distance issue.