Canopy Skin / Frame Rivets
A big day today - i riveted the canopy ribs to the canopy skin. 4 hours work ad 202 rivets!
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| I found that the normal mushtoom set was a lot easier to control on the skins than the swivel mushroom set - no idea why! |
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| I set a few rivets with this, then went back to the normal mushroom set. |
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| I checked for twist regularly |
The canopy frame close out skin was then clecod on, and the canopy frame splices were final drilled.
The two forward frames were riveted to the skin, then the canopy was once again checked for twist.
The aft most (cockpit side) canopy frames were riveted to the skin, then the joiner splice was attached using reduced size head NAS1097 rivets. This is a pretty clever method - the splice was countersunk, just barely, to accept the smaller heads of the NAS1097 rivets, as this splice will be against the canipy frame (the one attached to the fuselage). This means the shop head is on the cockpit side - so a cupped set is used to make the shop heads look nice.
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| This side will face the pilot.. |
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| ... and this side will be flush agaisnt the fixed cockpit panel. |
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| The rivets between the aft panel frame and the intercostals could be reached with the squeezer. |
Canopy Close Out Rivets
Another another big day - this time 4 hours and 113 rivets.
Next up was to check for any twist (and take it out), then final drill the holes between the canopy close out and the canopy structure. These were drilled undersize initially, to allow for better alignment, then get final drilled to #40 or #30 at this stage. They are then solid rivetd on the aft frames (where there is access), and pull riveted ont he forward frame where these it no access.
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| The rudder trailing edge scraps are still coming in handy! |
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| The aft frames are pull riveted - the plans call for -4 length, but these seemed a bit long.. |
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| ... so -3 rivets were used. |
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| No twist! |
Of course, i had to try it out on the aeroplane! I had not final cockput painted the panel parts at this stage, so just cleco'd it all together.
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