Dave’s RV-7A Building Log

Cleaned a bunch of parts and skins in preparation for spraying some interior paint.

Dimpled the forward bottom skin and the forward and baggage bulkheads.

I’m going to try to paint the interior parts before I put them together. The only disadvantage I see to this is that the rivets won’t get painted and I might scratch the paint during the rest of the aseembly. That doesn’t matter too much to me as I’m going to get one of the interior upholstery kits. I used a Scotchbrite pad to scuff up the parts and skin areas that will show in the cabin.

Dimpled both forward side skins with the C-frame.

Deburred the edges of the left forward side skin and deburred the holes on the other side. I also took the squeezer and dimpled the holes around the edges.

Looking more carefully at the plans, I discovered that the lower hole of the forward tank attach needs to be drilled out and dimpled/countersunk for a #10 screw. I’ll do that when I put things back together.

The last thing I did was attach nut plates to the F-902 bulkheads, and the horizontal baggage wall stiffeners. The vertical baggage stiffener doesn’t get nut plates installed until one of the covers is on.

Looking over my list of things to do, I basically just need to get out the C-frame and dimple the rest of the skins. I’m getting close to putting this thing back together.

Riveted the reinforcement angles to the arm rests. They feel very solid now.

Deburred the holes on the left forward side skin.

Back from nearly a week off. We went to Sun Peaks in B.C. for some skiing. Actually, I learned to snowboard while Julie and Adele skied. We had a great time, but it’s a long drive up and back–6 hours of driving. It’s a little over an hour in an RV, 200 nm. I also just figured out that Aero Sport Power is located at Kamloops Airport. We drove right by there. I could have stopped in for a tour. Darn.

To break back into the project after the trip, I did a little deburring on the left forward side skin.