Sat Oct 13 2007

New bucking bar

After doing "real" work for about five hours today (ugh...not much of a way to spend a Saturday), I went out to the machine shop to make a custom bucking bar to buck a few rivets that are inaccessible behind the flap brace. After about three and a half or four hours on the milling machine, I ended up with this fella. Note the triangular shape...the sides are angled the same as the space between rear spar, skin, and flap brace. The tapped holes are there for me to screw in some bolts to use as handles.

Here's the pile of chips I had to pick out of my sneakers. There's no way I could be a machinist for a living. Way too much like work. :-)

Here's the new bucking bar in position. Kerin ran the gun and I used the new bucking bar to buck the rivets that're hidden in here. They came out great.

By the way, if anyone runs into the same situation as me and needs to borrow this bucking bar, you're welcome to it. Just pay for the shipping both directions and I'll ship it to you.

Once I got those hidden rivets taken care of, I was able to install and rivet in the first and second ribs into the left wing. The only thing left to do on this wing is to prime the outside of the fuel tank and screw it in place. I also installed the second rib on the right wing. Greg's coming over tomorrow, so we should be able to get the right wing completed easily.