It was another post midnight last night as the 4 wing strut posts were drilled, assembled and aligned. The build diagrams suggest building them back to back in matched pairs .. a very sensible idea if you would like Port and Starboard wings to have equal spacing and support !

Using the final joining bolt each pair is aligned and the holes drilled out and nickel riveted. Drilled through the brackets and then de-burred, then drilled through the posts once aligned. !00’s of holes and then managed to run 7 rivets short ! arggggghhh

Trying to get both lower wings ‘fully loaded’ and completed so it doesn’t skew any of the final setup and balance and alignment of the wings. Added the second (Port) wingtip this weekend …. was a little tighter fit than the previous .. but have left them both ‘oush fitted’ for now before I finally commit to fibre glassing in place.

Started to cut templates to seat the propeller in the spinner.

You don’t get more than one chance at cutting this nice spinner ! so will take a few 100 measures first !

With the lower wings nearing final setup (leading edge and wing tips going on and aileron bellcranks and pushrods in place) I have started to prepare the Interplane struts

The initial brackets have been pre-drilled which is extremely useful … these now require shaping and trimming down.

Initial shaping and now ready for final finishing

Before I can start to trestle up the lower wing for more test fits and final fit/rigging I need to ensure that all major parts are completed so it has an all up representative weight of the finished object (minus covering).

That means completing the leading edge fitting using the scarfed panels, 3 per leading edge. The soaking in the bath really helped but I discovered the original jig I created didn’t give it enough bend. Last weekend I had a nightmare evening trying to get the first leading edge panel to wrap around the wing. Eventually, as Paul usually says, if it doesn’t look right it probably isn’t !! I gave up, removed all the glue and left it all alone.

Took the 2 panels I have pre shaped back and re-wet and made an adjustment to the jig. Much better now and the first one offered up to leading edge wrapped around nicely with very little effort to get it to seat.

Last night glued the first one in place

and this morning fixed the second. Only doing one at a time so that I make sure it all clamps down well and true full width with the battons.

Final inboard section added

The wing tips are provided per moulded with a very neat finish.

They are a very snug fit with small indentations to cater for the wing gussets. Just need to carefully and slowly trim a little of the trailing edge of the outboard rib to get the tip to seat nicely.

I also plan to get some small strobes in place so need to get these fitted soon before access becomes an issue.

My youngest, Sam, is back from Uni and always makes a point of getting up to the barn.

The other night it was final wing gussets needing Aerloite’ing in place … we were a couple of larger gussets short so Sam made a template out of one and made up 3. Once these were on and clamped he then helped with the multi handed job of swaging the inner aileron turnbuckles.

These have all been done single handed by me so far .. not an easy task with that huge crimper (STILL on loan from the very very nice people at Channel Island Aero Services (CIAS) … many many thanks for the long term use Bob, Bob, Graham …. nearly onto the last swaging … MUST be because I don’t have many thimbles left !