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I wasn’t happy with the way the first Z-bracket turned out after back-drilling it through the spar. One of the holes in the spar ended up slightly elongated. Instead I went a different route. For each bracket, I lined it up with a bolt through the middle hole and squared it to the spar. I then marked the location of the other two holes with a marker. I then drilled them on the drill press. With the center line already marked, it was pretty easy. For me, it was easier then back-drilling through the spar. I checked each one and they are lined up perfectly.
I then deburred all of the holes. Next was doing the nut plate drilling: bolt on the nut plate, make it straight drill one side hole to #40, cleco, and then drill the other hole. Nut plates are so much fun. After that, I countersunk all of the side holes.
I think I’m going to prime the brackets before putting on the nut plates, but not tonight. Instead, I pulled out the tank ribs. I had already squared up the flanges to 90 degrees, but never fluted them. Now’s the time. Grab a beer, crank up the tunes, and dive in. I fluted all the tank ribs for left and right. And just to finish up the fluting for good, I did the funky inboard rib for the right leading edge. All ribs are now fluted!!! I’m glad that’s behind me. One big priming session on the right wing ribs and the right wing will be ready to put together. I’m glad I did all of the prep work for both wings together.
The last thing I did was to pull out the right tank skin and put in the cradle. All ready for assembly.