Installed the WD-641 roll bar - 3 hours

 Time to install the WD-641 roll bar permanently. Now that the paint of the front deck is fairly dry and cured, I am ready to work in this area. One thing that I researched this morning was if other builders trimmed the excess steel on the mounting plate. Nobody seems to talk much about it, but from what I can tell in all of the pictures I have, everyone has trimmed this down.

 I placed the roll bar on the fuse and drew my reference lines. Yup, I have 2x edge distance so I am good to trim according to my lines. Obviously an angle grinder is a bad idea as the heat wrecks the powder coat and I’m sure will mess with the welds. So I went to town with the hacksaw.

 A final finish on the sander station and the trim was a success. I primed the bare cut steel and touched up with white colour matched paint. Did I mention how nice it was to have my 3D printed wrenched for the rear AN4 bolts?!?!

 Next, I riveted the F-793 vent brackets to the fuselage 

 I am now ready to start in on the canopy…… I hope. I've temporarily fit the canopy frame on the fuselage and I can see that I have to make adjustments to the forward bow of the canopy frame to match the lines of the roll bar. You can see how the bow on the canopy frame kicks out on the right side (when looking from the front).

Painting the forward canopy deck - 5.5 hours

 Well since the weather is nice, today is a painting day. Before I can bolt the roll bar on permanently, I need to paint the forward Canopy decks.

This actually turned out to be much more of a pain than I was hoping it would be. I prepped everything nicely and gave a final light wipe with acetone. Then I sprayed it with one stage final coat. It was perfect! Then I noticed a fish eye on one of the rivet spots. I’m sure I could have left it as-is, but I chose to whip the paint off, clean, re-prep the area, and re-spray. This takes about an hour or two in all…so progress was slow.  Crap, I got a run in the paint!!! Wipe it off…..redo all over again. The third spray was good (not prefect) but good. 

In the mean time, I noticed that my paint on the forward center cover (F-982E access plate) was failing. The paint must not have mixed correctly when I first sprayed it last year?. Well.. fortunately the paint wiped off with heavy doses of acetone. The epoxy primer underneath is not phased by the acetone, do I didn’t have to really re-prime, I just had to work at getting all of the old paint off, prep and re-spray it. This time the paint was perfectly mixed. (I looked over all other interior pieces and everything was fine, this part was the only piece that had signs of paint failure).

 

While still on a roll with the priming and painting, I decided to give the NACA ducts some attention. I’m sure that I could have primed them just fine well after they were installed, but why not give them a good once over now while they are accessible. A gave a light wipe down of the plastic with acetone. Being very careful with the acetone as it melts this plastic. 

 

More riveting of the the Fwd Fuselage Ribs - 3 hours

For now, l clecloed the junk F-7105B-L rib into place as well as all the other F-7108 and F-7107 ribs.

 I managed to rivet both remaining ribs to the firewall. For the next step I choose to rivet the F-7108B angle to the F-7108A rib. The plans have you do this riveting prior to setting the rib into place, but I chose to do it this way instead as everyone complains that the riveted assembly is very difficult to get the F-7105A center sub panel set into place after. 

Space for the rivet gun was tight, but using the smallest rivet set I had allowed me just enough room to buck these perfectly. I did most of the rivets, leaving the last AN4 rivet open. I did this to allow me to easily slip the roll bar down tube into place. If I rivet it now I fear I am really going to have issues getting that down tube in and out. I’ll save it for later.

 

Riveting the Fwd Fuselage Ribs to the Firewall - 1.5 hours

 Well, got news back from Van's that a new F-7105B-L sub panel is out of stock and is going to be approximately Sept 18th for it to ship. Totally understandable as Van's has lots of issues with their 3rd party suppliers laser cutting process. I imagine they parts stock is suffering everywhere.

Well, Looks like I will just have to build the front deck and fit the sub-panel later when it comes in. I started in by riveting the right F-7108 Fwd Fuselage Rib to the Firewall. It went very well and the rivets sent nicely. 

Started riveting the fwd fuselage rib pieces together - 3 hours

 Its always fun to start riveting freshly primed parts. Its so gratifying to see it come together in its final form

I riveted the F-7109 plate to the F-7108A rib.

 Next, I decided to rivet the F-7108C angle to the F-7108A rib. I’ve been scratching my head for a while how best to assemble and rivet this front deck. I’m fairly certain that my method will work well as it’s served me very well during fit up.

Next, I riveted the 3 nutplates into the ribs.

 Now to sort out how to rivet the good F-7105-R rib onto the fuselage. Fortunately for me a while back I bought an assortment of cherry max rivets in various sizes. According to my gauge I need CR3213-4-2 length which I have. So I went to work.

 

Now I was careful to prep these rivets according to Vans recommendation video on cherry max rivets

https://youtu.be/lb9miRllZDo

I lubed them with WD40 and then set them one by one. Access was tight, but I managed to get all 6 of them set perfectly. I sooo wish I had did this on the left side.

 

Disaster strikes on the left F-7105B sub panel - 1.5 hour

Next step to finish the riveting of the subpanels, was to install the six AN4704-4 rivets to the fuselage rib. Unfortunately the access in this area is horrible for both the pneumatic gun and for bucking bars. The angle of the fuselage side skin makes things poor for the gun, and the lip on the fuselage rib makes it difficult for the bucking bar. I ended up using the double offset rivet set and the results were disastrous. 

The first rivet was ok, but not great. The second was about the same. The third was terribly slumped. Not any good at all. I have to remove these! Standard rivets are just going to be awfully difficult to set correctly for me.

 

After inspection, the two top left holes are in good shape, the bottom left is not usable. The 3 on the right are perfect and untouched. Now, how to figure out an acceptable fix? There is no question that I will order a new F-7105B-L sub panel. After consulting with some knowledgeable friends, we decided that replacing the F-902-L fuselage bulkhead is not the most wise. The fix we settled on was to clean and salvage the fuse bulkhead. Install a new sub-panel and fabricate a 0.032" patch to fit behind. Essentially sandwich the fuse bulkhead between the patch and the new sub-panel. Of course I will abandon the idea of using solid rivets here due to the high risk of damaging the parts...again. I will have to use cherry max rivets here.  

I used the dremmel and I deburred the holes with scotch brite. I used a round file on the large oblong hole to take out any sharp edges, as well I polished it with 800 grit sandpaper on the dremmel. I do not want any cracks forming from this spot. 

Next, I cleaned and prepped the areas to spot prime.

Started riviting the F-7105B sub-panels to the Fwd Canopy Decks - 1.5 hours

 Excited to finally get these pieces together, I started with clecoing the F-7105B sub-panels to the fuselage assembly. The easiest rivets to attack straight away are the AN4704-4 rivets that attach the Sub-Panels to the Fwd Canopy Decks.  

Priming the forward canopy deck parts - 6 hours

 Big day in the garage today. To start I cleaned and spot primed the fwd canopy decks to cover the newly installed rivets

Next, I took some time to debur, file and clear all edges and nooks/crannies of the forward canopy deck parts. 

 I set up the garage for a priming run which takes a while to set up and the process itself is a lot of work. Soap wash and scrub with scotch-brite, rinse, acid etch, rinse, MEK wipe, prime!

Installing the right F-721 fwd canopy deck - 2 hours

 I managed to squeak out a small work session today. I riveted the right F-721 fwd canopy deck to the fuselage.

 As well, I needed to dimple the holes for the vent support brackets in the fuselage side skins. I used the pop rivet dimple dies for this. While they do the job, they don’t do the best job at making a crisp dimple. On the other hand…ever try to drill accurate holes when they are already dimpled?…haha can’t be done. I will live with these being so so dimples.

 

 Last small item, I riveted the 4 nutplates onto the fwd canopy decks.

Installing the left F-721A fwd canopy deck - 3 hours

 Well, this part of the build has taken some time to finally get to. Riveting the F-721A forward canopy decks to the longerons. Some builders choose to get these installed early in the canopy deck fitup. I however left it to the bitter end. (I suppose I don't like things becoming permanent unless they need to be).

Riveting these on is fairly easy when working forwards then aft. The tricky part comes in as you get to the last (aft) two rivets. Accessibility becomes very tight and in order to buck these I had to use a very long, but very slim tungsten bucking bar.
 

Re-frabricating the Fwd Fuselage rib assembly - 5 hours

 Upon part inspection I'm just not pleased with my Fwg Fuselage rib assembly. A few holes for the F-7108A rib and the F-7108B angle are not to my liking. I have some rivet holes that holes that are just a bit too open making the rivet fit sloopy. As well as the holes for the AN3 bolts on the canopy brace were not perfectly square in the angle. Likely cause I reamed these by hand in place. Fortunately, the holes in the canopy brace are perfect as I did my final ream on the drill press. 

I had re-ordered a new F-7108A and spent the entire day re-fabricating the entire F-7108 fed fuselage rib assembly. Re-drilled the F-7108A rib to the firewall, I made a new F-7108B Angle and F-7109 Plate.

 

Making a doubler for the F-721D attach angle - 2 hours

 I just cant bring myself to riveting the attached angle on to sloppy holes, and I also dont want to risk re-drilling new parts through existing holes on the longerons. So after discussing options with a fellow builder (Mike with the Stewart S-51 and F1 Rocket) I figured it best to simply fabricate a doubler for the F-721D attach angle. I pulled out some 0.040" scrap and sketched out a quick shape. I then used the proper right side attach angle to drill new crisp #30 rivet holes. Then using an edge distance of around 0.25" I located two #40 holes to attach the doubler to the forward canopy deck. On initial fit, I see that I have to trim a small angle to clear the inside radius of the canopy deck. Also I need to trim the doubler to clear the longeron.

Once happy with the fit, I committed to drilling the two #40 holes in the forward canopy deck. 

Re-clecoed the forward canopy deck into the fuselage and verified fit. 

I am pleased with how it turned out (not pleased that I had to do it in the first place). I then acid etched the doubler and primed it. After a few hours dry time on the primer, I then riveted the doubler and the F-721D attach angle to the canopy deck.