After spending a week on vacation, it took me another week or so to catch up at work and home. I got back to building this memorial weekend.

I primed the Vertical Stabilizer parts, and rather than just waiting a day and a half, I figured I’ll give the primer at least three days to dry. Compared to the Horizontal Stabilizer, I was VERY pleased with how the primer came out. I used a lot less of it, and it went on very evenly. I think the secret is to stir the bottle with the drill press, rather than just with a paint stirrer.

While the stuff dries out, I started on the rudder. I made rudder stiffeners and deburred all of the surfaces. Today I match drilled the stiffeners to the skins.

After drilling, I cleaned up every hole by hand. The skins are incredibly thin, and I figured I would go right through them if I used my deburring tool. Some of the holes still weren’t completely smooth, so I used a scotch-brite pad to clean up all the bits of aluminum. So far so good…
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Starting on the Rudder   May 4th, 2006

At this point I need to prime the Vertical Stabilizer before proceeding. Since I’m going out of town in a couple of days, I decided to start on the rudder. So, I spent about an hour fabricating rudder stiffeners…some pictures when I get back!

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