Major Sections

26 December 2013

Empennage: Rudder. Assembly for trailing edge match drilling.

I decided to redo my rudder due to the trailing edge.  Here is the post outlining the new rudder.

Cutting the many stiffeners is easily accomplished with the band saw using the sliding miter guide set to the appropriate angle with the part cleco'd into a wood block for alignment.


Next was assembly of the skeleton for the skins.  Remarkably, I was short AN470AD4-6 rivets so I couldn't attach the nutplates yet.


Right skin on.


The trailing edge wedges, like for the ailerons and flaps, must be match drilled to the skins.  I used a wood block cut to 84 degrees to ensure my drill was orthogonal to the wedge's chord.  I positioned the VA-140 wedge so that it aligned with the bottom of the skins.  Turns out the holes in the skins are such that, by aligning the wedge just so, I only needed one cut of the wedge at the top to trim it to size.


It's interesting that the right skin lap joint has a hole in the middle that is not used.  Only one of those middle holes is match-drilled from the left lap joint.


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