07 October 2013

Wings: Ailerons. Stiffeners.

The aileron stiffeners start life in the kit as 8 pieces of aluminum with notches defining the lines to cut them to shape.


I had to think of a way to cut those straight after marking the lines with a straight edge.  Here's what I came up with.  First, the short cuts (up-and-down in the image above) were trivial on the band saw using the sliding miter guide.  But for the other cuts, I took a short piece of wood and drilled a deep hole to accept a fully compressed #40 cleco in it.  Then, I cleco'd each unfinished stiffener to the wood so I could use the sliding miter guide to track the angled cuts properly, keeping them straight and also normal to the piece.

This was about a 15 degree angle.


This was about 5 degrees.


Repeat 32 times, and you get a pile of cut stiffeners that politely request deburring.


Also, the ailerons require some parts to be dimpled with 120 degree dies (dice?), specifically the outboard rib to stiffeners rivet holes.

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