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[June 6, 2007]


I spent about an hour fluting the 8 seat ribs. This process reminded me too much of fluting wing ribs - thank god it didn't take very long. I also checked the flanges on the baggage ribs. Luckily these guys were almost perfect right out of the box.


Next was onto the fun part - clecoing together the center fuselage bulkheads to the seat and baggage ribs. Don't forget to use the 4 1/8" spacers in the right places.


Another shot of this magnificent creation. If I had to do it all over again, I wouldn't clamp the F-715 ribs to the F-704 - I would leave this guys alone on the shelf.



I drug out the bottom skin from my basement and clecoed it to the center section. I was low on clecoes so I needed to borrow them from the various contraptions in my garage that are in need of riveting.


Van's has a construction FAQ PDF relevant on the center fuse named "A common RV-7/7A and RV-9/9A fuselage construction question". Specifially, there are 4 rivets between the center fuse skin and the forward F-704 bulkhead on a -7 that need special consideration. Because of possible interference with some floor stiffeners, these rivets need to be set double-flush (like the trailing edge of the rudder).


These are the 4 rivets - from the outboard rivets, they are in position 11 and 19.




I finished off the night by match drilling most of the holes on the skin.
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Last Modified: August 13, 2023