A diversion

So it has been quite a while since I last posted on my Long-EZ build progress. For the most part this is because I done very little with the project for the past 5 months or so.

After I drilled the wing/spar bolt holes I test fitted the spar wings and canard on to the fuselage. It was great to see all these major parts assembled into something that looked like an aircraft.

Unfortunately after assembling all of this I sat down in the garage to take a break and then noticed a problem. The main spar and wings were level, but the canard was not. How could this be?! The canard was level with the fuselage longerons and so was the spar. After more investigation, I found that the fuselage has some twist to it. I will now have to remount the canard to fix the problem. Not a big deal, but I hate having to do things twice.

The other problem I have is that not having two wings, a canard and a fuselage with a spar mounted, there is very little room to navigate my garage. Something had to be done to fix this, so today I dissembled my small work bench and slid the large work table up to the wall where the bench used to be. This now gives me enough room to move about. I need to re-organize the shop and upgrade the lighting.

Chapter 19 - Wings - Part 19

Since my last update I have completed installation of the right wing aileron and nearly completed the left wing aileron.

Today Marc and I loaded the wings and center spar into his truck and headed down the street to my work supervisor, Pete's, house, where he has a nice 3 car garage. We proceeded to level the wings on 6 of the cheapest crappiest saw horses I have ever used. I purchased 4 of them a couple of days earlier. Coincidentally Pete also had two of them on hand as well.

Finally after dropping the center spar on the floor of the garage once, we managed to get the wings set up pretty stable and level. We used standard bubble levels, Marc's laser level and a water level to ensure the wings were set up correctly.

We then proceeded to match drill through the center spar into the wing attachment points. I started out using the spot face tool as described in the plans, however that was a very slow process and I managed to burn up my drill. We then switched to a 5/8" bi-metal hole saw that I purchased today as advised by Marc, who probably did a lot of research into the procedure than me.

In the end all went quite well and I am very happy with the results.

Chapter 19 - Wings - Part 18

Last week and yesterday I finnished installing the wing root aileron hardware.

Pictured here is the infinity spherical bearing prior to bonding the click bond fasteners (seen bolted to the bearing houseing). I did make sure to sand the fiberglass and clickbond surfaces prior to flox and glass.

Pictured here is all of the wing root aileron hardware installed except for the pushrod and rod end bearings between the bellcranks.

Also yesterday I layed up the two plies of bid glass to close out the aileron ends. Today I cleaned up the edges and reinstalled the aileron.

With the left wing aileron work complete for now, I turned my attention to the right wing. Pictured here is the right wing aileron liberated from the wing.

Chapter 19 - Wings - Part 17

Today I completed installation of the aileron on the left wing.

The next step after removing the protective tape from the ailerons (see step 16) was to apply small dabs of bondo between the hinge and aileron. I used some small pieces of foam rubber to hold the hinge up against the aileron while the bondo set. This was a somewhat frustrating procedure as the plans do not explain well how to do this. I actually tried to complete this step last week and I gave up for the night.

Next I unbolted the hinges from the wing, removed the aileron and drilled holes through the hinge for rivets.

After test fitting the aileron on the wing and removing it again, I temporarily installed control hardware. The hardware store machine screws will be replaced with AN hardware soon.

Pictured here is the universal joint that connects the torque tube to the aileron.

Pictured here is a more complete view of the aileron control hardware including the spherical bearing (blue). Also in this photo, if you look close, you will see that I have yet to close up the end of the aileron with bid glass.



Chapter 19 - Wings - Part 16

More work today on the left aileron and wing.

Pictured here I have clamped a straight edge on the wing to guide me while cutting out the hinge notches on the top skin of the wing. This ensured that the hinges were all in line with each other and inset the proper amount.

Pictured below is the inboard most hinge with clickbonds test fitted. The plans call for a machine screw and a nutplate to be riveted to the hinge. The ckickbond fasteners are simpler to install and will have a seamless appearance then the wing if finished. This hinge happens to be 8" with three fasteners, the middle and outboard are 6" with two.  

Pictured here is the middle span hinge with showing the clickbond fasteners protruding through the top skin and hinge.

And here is the inboard hinge clickbonds floxed in place with two plies BID. The hinge has a protective clear tape to ensure that any flox or epoxy will not bond the hinge to the clickbond or wing.



Chapter 19 - Wings - Part 15

Work continued on the left aileron today. I completed fabrication of the A-2 and A-5 brackets.

Next I resessed the forward face of the aileron to mount the brackets flush with the foam surface. These were then bonded in place with micro along with the 9"x3/4" A-10 torque tube.



Chapter 19 - Wings - Part 14

Monday I was greeted at my front door by a box from the Cozy Girrrls containing many pieces of wing hardware.

Also earlier, last week, I received the wing root spherical bearings from Infinity Aerospace (the blue bearings in the photo).

And as luck would have it, another builder was selling extra universal joints and I managed to pick them up for a little under Aircraft Spruces price.

This weekend I will attempt to complete the left aileron and begin work on the right.

Chapter 19 - Wings - Part 13

A couple of weeks ago I began working on the left aileron. I started by carefully ripping down a scrap of lumber to create a 120 degree guide for the Fein tool while cutting the aileron from the tip wing skin.

Pictured here is the top wing skin after cutting. This part of the operation was done correctly. Unfortunately cutting the aileron from the bottom skin didn't go as well. I made a stupid mistake when transferring the measurements from the plans to the wing and then cut too much from the wing. I was really upset with myself for doing that, but after some calm planning I realized that the fix was not going to be a big deal at all. I glassed the aileron back onto the wing (underside only), let it cure and re-cut the aileron correctly, all was good in the universe again. Unfortunately I did not take the time to take photos of this process.

Pictured here is the left aileron with the 7/16" steel rod counter weight bonded in place.

Pictured here is the aft wing rib that is laid up with 3 plies BID glass into the area the aileron was removed.

Aileron control hardware should be arriving by UPS tomorrow. I hope to have this chapter wrapped up by then end of this month or early March.

Chapter 19 - Wings - Part 12

A few weeks ago I layed up the top spar cap of the left wing. Unfortunatly I received a phone call from my brother just before laying up the final 20" ply of spar cap uni. I spent a few to many minutes discussing Christmas plans and the spar cap epoxy started to gell. I layed on the final 20" ply, but it refused to wet out completely. I finaly gave up tring to save that ply and just let it cure completely.

After final cure I sanded off all of the uni roving that didn't wet out and applied a 22" piece over the repair area. 

Here is the section cureing just after the repair. Looks a little sloppy, but its not as bad as the picture lets on.

Here is the left wing after top skinning, again with the help of Marc Oppelt. This took us about 3 hours. Practice has made these large layups quicker. Recently there has been a friendly debate on one of the online forums about the value of using an epoxy pump. My opinion is that those expensive pumps are really neat, and probably worth the money, however even with the largest of layups like this top wing skin, the use of a digital scale and cheaper west system pumps works just fine. 

Yesterday I used the dremel tool to rout out 0.7" of foam from the forward inboard wing rib area, and today I layed up the three plies of bid glass. I now have two wings at this same stage.