29 December 2014

Fun Stuff: Number of rivets in wing, empennage and fuselage plans.

I counted the rivets called out for in the fuselage plans and updated the chart on the lower right of the blog's main page.  Here is just the fuselage rivet count.

Number of Rivets in an RV-14A 
Fuselage only (see complete chart here)

25. Fwd Mid Fuselage Bulkheads 284
26. Mid Fuselage Lower Structure 1,308
27. Firewall 439
28. Fwd Fuselage Lower Structure 541
29. Fwd-Mid Fuselage Side Structure 1,396
30. Aft Fuselage Attachment 465
31. Fuel System 30
32. Baggage Area 644
33. Rudder & Brake Systems 108
34. Flap Actuation System 0
35. Upper Fwd Fuselage 602
36. Aileron & Elevator Systems 51
37. Roll Over Structure 382


Empennage 4,446
Wings 8,276
Fuselage 6,250
FWF

Total: 18,972
The tail dragger would be very, very close to this number (in fact, same for wings).

I will update this list as my build progresses.  As always, it will live on the blog in the right column at the very bottom underneath the parts origin and skin thickness lists.  Direct link will be http://rv-14a.blogspot.com/#rivet_number

Want to wrap your brain around the mindlessness of the tasks involved in building a kit plane?  Consider that each of those rivets represents at least one hole (sometimes many more when parts are stacked) and each of those holes gets at least two deburring tasks and sometimes match/final drilling and/or countersinking/dimpling and/or sealant application too.  You can then calculate an upper-bound on the number of tasks per hole using some worst-case assumptions:  Just 6x the number of rivets to get a grasp on the number of tasks involved with the holes.

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