10 October 2015

Fuselage: Rudder and brake systems. Completed.

The rudder pedal assemblies took some time to get right.  The fitting of the correct washers and bolt tightness is a never ending back-and-forth, remove-and-redo game.  Eventually, it comes out right.


As an aside, the spacers from page 33-03 are difficult to cut straight.  I tried multiple times and just couldn't do it on my band saw.  Whilst I'm sure I'm not the first amateur machinist to devise this approach, here's what I came up with:  I cut the spacers intentionally too large, then chucked them into my drill press and brought them down on a file on both sides of the spacer until each was perfectly flat and just the right size.  I tried to get a picture of this, but the camera refused to focus on the subject, instead opting for the uninteresting background.  My apologies for the poor quality.


Installation of the assembly into the fuselage is quite easy, however you really have to pay attention to avoid over-torquing the nuts.  The balance between friction and free-play is made quite clear in the plans.  


The rudder cable guides took several hours to install.  It's nearly impossible to get access to the nuts and bolts and frustration was abound.  Here's how I ultimately secured the nuts:  First I positioned my wrench to work against the opposing bolt (left), then taped it down so it wouldn't fall when I was torquing the other side (right).


Eventually, each side gets done.  Left side shown below.


I think it's worth routing the rudder cables to the front of the aircraft prior to installing the baggage floors in Section 32.  It's still doable in Section 33, but it's much easier without the floors.  Anyway, I decided to prime and paint the cable CS-00015 cable links black to give them some contrast against the rest of the interior (cotter pins were not bent in this image).


The lines themselves are easy enough to cut, prepare and install.  The boiling water technique explained in Section 5-29 is very helpful to push the brass insert entirely into the tubing.  Boiling water?  Yep.  I love the varied building techniques used in this project!


Completed (I didn't finish the brake line routing until after I had installed parts from Section 35 as I was waiting for a #29 drill bit, hence the reason this image wouldn't match the end of Section 33).

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