Building the Cavalier 102.5

Building the Cavalier 102.5

This website is all about building the Cavalier 102.5 all wood aircraft.

The picture shown is the Cavalier I completed in 1982. It had a Lyc. 0-320 engine and cruised at 140 mph. Empty weight is 1067 lbs, and gross weight is 1650. I am now in the process of rebuilding the aircraft using a 0-290D2 engine. Also, I have started building a second Cavalier.

The pictures and text reflect the building process of the new Cavalier.

The Cavalier is a wood and fabric covered aircraft with excellent handling, slow stall speed and good cruise speeds.

This website shows pictures and text of the building process, as well as building tips, links to suppliers and other interesting info.

All information included on this site reflect only our opinions and methods to build the aircraft. It is not the designers builder manual.

My Favorite Links:

A lot of good information and links.

My Info:

Name:

David & Joe

Email:

dptmelby@sherbtel.net

More info about the Cavalier 102.5 can be found at: Cavalier Home Page. Information and Links.

Anyone interested in a similiar aircraft, the Celerity/Marathon should look at the following link. Celerity/Marathon Home Page.

These aircraft are wood frame with various types of covering. Take a look, they are aircraft that are not difficult to build and fun to fly.

Why build a wood and fabric aircraft? In this day and age of composite and modern aluminium aircraft it would seem that wood airplanes would be a thing of the past. To me, working with wood is more enjoyable than other mediums, and can be alot less toxic. Wood aircraft are strong, safe, and easy to build. If properly protected, the wood will last a lifetime and longer. Wood aircraft can be built lighter, as fast, and as safe as other more modern types of construction. Constructing an aircraft from wood requires only basic hand tools and a few power tools. Also, it is fun to work with.

We plan to have the fuselage all framed, the tail surfaces completed by spring 2007. I estimate total time to complete these items to be about 400-450 hours. We work an average of about 25 to 30 hours a week.

In June of 2006 we ordered spruce and plywood from Aircraft Spruce. We chose Aircraft Spruce because I have had excellent service from them and they have a huge inventory. All the spruce and plywood to build the fuselage and vertical tail came to about $1600.00. We decided to use FPL-16 epoxy also from ACS. We tried the new Gorilla glue but found it to messy for aircraft work. Besides, FPL-16 has been around for a long time and is a good structural glue. Rather than using nailing strips and nails or staples, we decided to direct nail all plywood and leave the nails in place. Wing skins will not have any nails left in place. Some guys prefer to remove all nails, but it was decided to leave them in where we can. We are using brass coated nails so there is little chance of rust or other problems resulting from the nails. Also, we are using a high quality ureathane spar varnish to protect the wood. More on that later.

Our shipment of spruce arrived in late July and we started to build right away. Unfortunalely, I didn't get any pictures of the framing process for the fuselage sides. In the picture below, you can see the fuselage sides with some of the completed bulk heads lying on the bench. The front side has the inner skin applied and the rear skin has only the plywood gussets applied. Note: All plywood must be sanded lightly before gluing or varnishing. Aircraft birch plywood has a thin wax like finish that comes from the manufacturing process. Using a 100 grit sandpaper takes this off nicely making a clean gluing surface. Mark the framing on both sides of the plywood. This insures that you will nail all members correctly. Building the fuselage frames and bulk heads goes very fast. We only have about 16 hours in building these parts.

Our goal is to keep the empty weight down around 900 lbs. The Cavalier can be built using engines frim the 0-200 Continantal to the 0-320 Lycoming. Right now, we are leaning toward using the 0-200 if we can keep the weight down near our goal. The 0-200 weighs alot less than the Lycoming engines, but also suffers a bit in power. Have not decided this at this time. I believe if we can keep the weight at 900lbs or less, and keep it clean, we will cruise around 135 to 140, with the 100 hp engine. We are also looking at the 912 Rotax engine. Better fuel economy and very smooth. Also very light. May be a good option.

The building process consists of laying out the fuselage side on the bench, adding jigging blocks at all framing members and gluing it together. Sounds simple, and it is. Care must be taken io insure that framing is straight and true. The framing jig will be used for both sides of the fuselage. The only difference is they must be built in mirror image of each other. Once the sides were built, I set them aside and built the bulk heads. Same process, lay out the bulk heads on the bench, and jig them up. One tip: Try to get all glue joints as tight as possible without distorting the frame. FPL-16 is not a good gap filler. As you can see, FPL16 is white in color and if you get a drop on your clothes, it seems to get on everything.

Number 3 bulk head, ready to go. Once all the bulk heads were built, we began to assemble the fuselage. We built a stand to assemble the fuselage on from 2x6 lumber, leveled it, laid out a center line and started building. The fuselage is assembled up side down on the jug. Since the top longeron is the fuselage reference line this makes it easy to build the fuselage. Care must be taken to insure that everything is square and true. It is very easy to rack or twist the fuselage while assembling.

Joint clusters. Notice that the glue joints are tight with no gaps. This makes for strong joints.

Clamps... A person cannot have enough clamps. I have about 75 and sometimes it is not enough. Spring clamps like the ones shown are the best for most glue joints involving plywood. I purchased most of mine from a discount building supply store ( Menards) for about $10.00 for 20 clamps. They are plastic clamps in 4 sizes which works great. I also have about 20 of the metal clamps as shown. I prefer the plastic type.

This is Verne Menzimer's Cavalier. What a beauty. We are going to use the same type of canopy style Verne used on his plane. Verne's Cavalier was Grand Champion at Oshkosh. If only our Cavalier turns out this nice. Years back Verne started a company called MAC, inc. He made trim servo's and other real nice things for home built aircraft. He sold the company to his sons and the name is now "The RayAllen Co. They can be reached at: www.rayallencompany.com. We plan to use these servos in this plane, even the stick grips. These guys are the best.

The fuselage main framing boxed up. The fuselage is now right side up sitting on the jig we built. As the fuselage was being assembled, we took measurments to make sure the thing was straight, square and true. It is easy to twist the framing as you install the diagonal members. Also, from frame three forward, now will be braced so this area remains correct. At this point, I have about 32 hours building time. Building a wood aircraft is a series of small jobs. Gluing gussets takes only about an hour of time. I find the process goes best if I have short periods of time to work on the plane rather than full days.

As you can see, I don't have a large shop. Basicly a single car garage. Not alot of room for tools, saws, etc. for building an airplane. But we manage. Power tools I find necessary are: Table saw, small band saw, cut off saw and a drill press. The band saw is the most used tool. Basic hand tools are a tack hammer, low angle block plane, metric measuring devices, drill motor, tons of clamps and most other hand tools you find in your garage. Also, since I am using epoxy glue, I use latex hand gloves for protection.
The wing will be built at the hangar during warm months.

If you are familiar with the Cavalier, you will notice that the area around the cockpit is different than shown on the plans. The top longeron extends at the same angle as the front portion of the longeron to behind the baggage compartment. This will be more apparent later as the fuselage comes together. At the firewall, you can see the reinforcing for the nose gear attachment. The nose gear mounts directly to the firewall so this area needs to be strong. Also in this picture, the assembly jig is more visible. This jig made it easy to assemble and to keep the frame straight and true. The cockpit area is covered with 3mm birch plywood to back behind the baggage area. Makes a very strong structure. Before closing any structure, it necessary to apply 2 to 3 coats of varnish. The darker area has been varnished since it will be difficult to get good protection behind the outer skin.

Building one of many bows. We layed out the shape of the bow on paper, then screwed blocks to the bench top in the shape of the bow. These bows are made from 1/8" birch plywood. Glued and clamped in place. One bow is being clamped and the other is ready to go with just blocking. I found that if I used spruce to make the bows, the bends were to tight for 1/8" material. Thus the use of birch plywood. Makes a very strong bow. When the glue is dry, the bow will be cleaned up and sanded. We made all the canopy bows, door frames, and turtle deck frames at the same time. Alot of work.

Here are most of the laminated frames and bows. The top one is the windshield frame/bow. the one with the plywood on one side is the bulkhead just behind the baggage area. This is a change from the plans, since we are building it like Verne Menzimers Cavalier. It will have a rear window, gull wing doors.

The spars for the vertical fin and the rudder. I ended up making the rudder spar 3 times. It didn't match the fin spar correctly, so I made another. I made an error on that one so I had to do a third. This time I got it right and it works very nice. Rather than rely on the demensions on the plans, I designed it to match the fin spar. It appears that the plans built spar is a little larger than it should be.

The picture below shows the turtle deck frames mounted in place as well as the center spine. We also added 2 1/2" sq. members between the second and third frames for extra stiffness. The entire turtle deck will get a 2mm plywood skin glued over the frames. The pluwood covered frame in the forground is the back of the baggage area and is about 11" high from the top longeron. The rear most frame is about 7" tall.

The firewall and panel frames being glued in place. Also, the windshield bow is clamped in place for reference. Still alot of small frame parts need to go in.

The firewall framing complete as well as the panel bow. We used corner blocks at all intersections of the framing members Care must be taken to be sure that all measurements are accurate. It is easy to have an error that becomes greater as you frame front to back. We take all measurements from the firewall. Even with all our precautions, we were off almost 1/8" at the tail post, which we needed to correct.

In this photo, you can see all the framing members necessary in the bottom/floor of the cockpit. The blocks at each corner are for engine and wing mount hard points, the center blocking is for the nose gear mount and all the other blocks are for mounting the Cessna rudder pedals we intend to use. It is very important to get all these blocks in prior to the bottom skin being applied. The bottom skin is laying just behind. We applied two coats of spar varnish to both surfaces. The areas where glue will be applied are masked off prior to varnishing. Be sure to lightly sand the glue areas prior to applying glue. You can just see a seam, (scarf joint) in the bottom skin. We ordered our plywood cut in 2x4' sheets for shipping purposes, so it was necessary to use two pieces of ply to make the bottom skin. Skarf joints are equally strong as the plywood if done correctly. This bottom skin is 3 mm ply.

The bottom skin applied. Note the lines on the skin. These are for nailing reference. I use a little trick to make sure enough glue has been applied. A few nail holes in the glue areas are used. If enough glue is in the joint, it will be squeezed thru the holes. On 3mm ply, I nail about every 2". Thinner ply requires a closer nailing schedule.

Things are really coming together nicely. I'm happy with the progress and quality.

Vent holes must be drilled thru the bottom skin in each bay. The holes should be about 1/4" they don't show up in this photo. The date on the photos is incorrect. I should read 2006

The roll bar frames glued in place. You can see the cockpit area coming together in this photo. Also the modified baggage compartment. Also, you can see how the to longeron is extended upward. This angle will continue back to the plywood bulkhead shown . The roll bar will get a boick on each side for the harness attachment, ant plywood skins inside and out. the inside skin will be 2mm and the outside skin will be 3mm plywood. This makes a very strong roll bar, but light. We are using reel type shoulder harness. The reel will be attached inside the baggage compartment and then up to a clip similiar to automotive types. More on this later.

The roll bar taking shape. The block is for the harness pickup and the plastic tube is a conduit for electrical wiring to the overhead panel..the overhead panel will have cockpit lights, and plugs for head sets. The picture on the right shows the inside skin being glued in place. Picture below is the center section of the canopy being glued.

A plastic cover will be made to protect the reel when finished. The pivot point is 9" above the AC top longeron.

I do not like the harness pickup to be below my shoulders. So, I decided to use a single harness similar to auto style. I built in a hard point in the side of the baggage compartment, as well as the one in the roll bar. As you can see in the photo below a simple aluminium swivel device allows the harness to swing forward when the harness is pulled to the lap belt. These reel type harnesses are available for aircraft use. System workes great.

Looking down into the unfinished baggage compartment. The center section will be enclosed to make a tunnel for controls. The inside floor skin has not been installed at this time. Also, you can see the hard points for the rear wing mount brackets and the seat belt mounts.

Front fin spar is in place as well as one side skin. The leading edge of the fin is just setting in place at this time. The entire inside of the fin will get two coats of spar varnish prior to installing the second skin.

Both sides of the vertical fin are glued in place. The inside of the second skin was varnished prior to installing. Glue areas were masked off before varnish. When the tape is removed, it is a good idea to lightly sand all glue areas prior to applying the glue. Leading edge is also now glued in place. The copper tape you see on the side of the leading edge is the Comm antenna. This is available from RST Engineering is Grass Valley, Cal. Have one in my other Cavalier and it works good. Completely hidden, and costs only a few dollars.

Rudder spar is laid out for gluing. I draw a center line on the paper, and measure the width of the spar on each side at each rib. Once the glue is dry I will apply the skin to one side of the spar. Note the vertical fin skin in the background, with varnish applied.

The rudder taking shape. Ribs are glued in place, diagonal supports for one side in place and the trailing edge is glued on. Care must be taken when handling at this point. Once a skin is applied, it becomes strong. But not at this time. Notice I clamped the spar to a staight edge. In this case a 4' level. It is easy to build in a bend in the spar, so I clamped the spar to the level until one skin was glued on. This keeps the spar straight.

The second skin being glued and clamped in place. Remember what I said about having enough clamps.

Completed tail section.

My new rudder hinge. The half of the hinge attached to the tail post is made from 1/8" alum angle, and the other half that is attached to the rudder spar is a rod end bearing. I am using one with a 5/16" dia. shaft, and a 1/4" dia hole. The rod end has a swiveling bearing, which makes a great hinge. The rudder moves without any friction at all.
Since the nuts holding the hinges will be hidden, I used self alligning nut plates. the top hinge has 2 3/16" bolts and the bottom hinge has four. I used #2 stainless screws to hold the nut plates in place. It's important to varnish under the nut plates, prior to installing them.
You may notice another thing I did a little different. The tail post has 1.5 mil plywood on both sides rather that one as the plans call out. I thought it was a nicer installation. This makes the area that is exposed in the opening for the stabilizer much cleaner looking. Drain holes must be drilled in all bays of the spar, in the lower corners and on the aft side.

this is the start of another change I am making. Since I am using Cessna rudder pedals, the rudder cables must cross with the type of horn used in the plans. This rudder bell crank mounts on frame 9 and includes adjustable rudder stop as you can see in the picture. The rudder cables will attach to each end of the bell crank. From the bell crank, a pushrod will go to a rudder horn mounted on the rudder spar. This system keeps all of the rudder controls inside the airframe. The rudder pushrod is one inch alum tubing with a rod end on each end. With this system, the rudder cables do not cross, keeping the installation simple and mistake free. More pictures on this later.

The Rudder System, complete. At least from the cables to the rudder. In the picture on the left, you can see the rudder horn at the base of the rudder. The push rod attaches to the right side of the rudder and goes forward to the left side of the bellcrank. A 1 1/4" hole is required in the tail post. The hole goes thru the post where solid blocking is installed so no loss in strength. You can se the rudder stop bracket in the front. The rudder horn is made from .90 4130 steel, with the cable attachment holes 6" apart. The push rod is 1" alum with rod ends that fit inside the tubing and are riveted in place. This system works better than I expected. Full rudder movement is achieved. In the photo on the right you can see the conduit (white plastic tubing) for the wiring to the top of the fin. The black coax cable is from the built in comm antenna.

The beginning of the base for mounting the windshield. We laid out the shape of the windshield on top of the cowl and glued on a series of short wedge shaped blocks to make the area where the lexan meets the cowl. On this plane, the wedge blocks are about 20 degrees at the front and they get less of an angle tword the edges. After bonding the wedges in place, they were sanded down to make a nice even surface for bonding the lexan. A mixture of epoxy and cotton flock was used to bond the lexan. Any excess epoxy needs to be wiped off imediately. Small screws were used to hold the lexan in place until the epoxy cured..

Just finished glassing the windshield in place. We decided to use Lexan for the windshield since it is a wrap. It is made from 1/8" Lexan. After much cutting and fitting, the Lexan was bonded in place with small screws holding it in place until the epoxy cured. Then, 2 layers of 3.16 oz fiberglass was laid over the top with about 1" lapped over the Lexan, at the edges. When the epoxy cures, the fiberglass is sanded down to a nice finish where it meets the Lexan. The protective cover will remain in place as long as possible to prevent any damage to the windshield. Lexan is very strong and unbreakable, but is easier to scratch than Plexiglass, and difficlut to repair.

The frames of the gull wing doors temporarly mounted. The geometry of the hinge is a difficult to figure out, since the door comes out of the opening at a bit of an angle. It appears I will need to use some sort a swiveling hinge pin to make it work correctly, since the angle of the hinge pin is slightly different in the open position than when closed. These door frames fit in the opening with about 1/16" margin all around. This should make for a tight final fit for the doors. As you can see, the top of the doors drop into the cabin when open. Turns out this is not a problem for persons entering or exiting the cabin. I plan to use a small vinyl gasket to seal the doors.

In the lower left hand corner of the picture you can see the removeable fiberglass cover I made for over the top of the cowling under the windshield. this allows me to install fabric on the cowltop with a very nice fit right up to the front of the windshield.

I have lots more pictures of the progress on the plane, but I am having trouble up loading them from my files. When I get this figured out alot more photos will show up.

Another fine example of a Cavalier. This one was built by Fred Bruinsma, of Canada. Fred rebuilt the entire aircraft after a hangar fell in on it. He also added retractable gear as you can see. Fred's Cavalier won best all wood aircraft at Sun-n-Fun 2006. Fred reports 155 mph cruise. He has a 135 hp. Lyc. 0-290D2 installed. Also, you can see that Fred used the canopy style shown in the plans. Nice job.

Building the tail plane spars. As you can see, I made jigs for each spar using blocks screwed to the bench top.
first, I fastened a sheet of rosin paper to the bench, then drew the center line of each spar, and marked out the depth of the spar at each rib location. I then made the intercostal blocking to fit at each station. When I was satisfied with the fit of all the blocking, I glued and clamped the blocks in place. After the glued dried, I run the spars through my surface planer to get a perfectly flat surface to glue the plywood too. I only removed about 1mm from the spars in this process. The next step is gluing the plywood skin to one side of each spar.

The completed framework for the stabilizer/elevator. I've set them in place to test for proper fit. Everything seems to be correct, so the next step is to begin applying the skins. Note the alignment block between the spars. These are used to keep the elevator in correct trail.

Another view of the tail section. Rudder is in place, also.

gluing the skins on the elevator. I takes lots of clamps for this since we do not want any nails showing thru the covering of the elevator.

This photo shows one side has the plywood skin applied. the skins extend 1 1/4" aft of the rear spar. this area will conceal the elevator leading edge cuff. Also, at the bottom of the picture you can see the plywood doubler we used for joining the skins rather than scarf joints.
We made a change to the leading edge. Rather than trying to bend the plyood skin around the tight radius, we installed a strip of wood about 3/4x 1 1/4" at the leading edge. The wod strip was then cut to the shape of the leading edge and the plywood skin lapped over about 1/2". this makes for a simple yet strong edge to the stabilizer. After both skins were applied, a little filler was required to get a perfect shape, and 2 layers of 3.5 oz fiberglass clothe was used to give it added strength and protection from stones, etc.

Applying the top skins to the stabilizer. Note how the skins are varnished prior to being glued in place. Use masking tape to cover the areas that will get glue, and apply 2 or 3 coats of quality spar varnish the the inside of the stabalizer and to the inside of the skin. When removing the tape, sand the glue areas lightly prior to gluing.

This is the mount I designed to hold the MAC trim servo. I bonded not plates to the underside of the mount. the acess panel has a 3 mm doubler on the inside and you can see the nut plate that will hold the panel in place. The panel has spring clips to hold the leading edge in place.

This is the stabilizer mounting area at the back of the fuselage. I put a 2 degree taper to the blocks prior to gluing them in place. I also added a small block at the the front to increase the area where the stab mounts. The white plastic tube is a conduit for wiring to the top of the vertical fin

The fairing for the stabilizer being roughed in. I used 4 layers of 8.8 oz cloth and epoxy resin to make the fairing. Cloth was laid up over foam that was sanded to shape. You can just see the pink foam through the fiberglass.

The begining of the cabin doors. The wood framing you see was used to make the compound curve of the canopy. Blocks of foam were used to make the basic shape. I used foam blocks that were 2" wide and about 3" thick. Using a surform sander, it took only a short while to get the shape I wanted. I then sanded the foam smooth and laid up 6 or 7 layers of 8.8 oz bid cloth over the foam. I made a offset at the window to accept the 1/8" plexiglass. The doors turned out light and work very nicel.

Another view of the canopy. At first, I had thought I would make the entire door plexiglass much like Verne Menzimer did on his Cavalier. After some thought, I decided to make the doors only half glass. I like the protection from the sun on top. Below you can se the cabin doors have been fiberglassed. The fiberglassed area where the plexiglass will be has been made into a mold for shaping the plexi. I backed it with several more layers of cloth to make it more rigid.

The hinge and canopy door latch. The hinge consists of a anchor not mounted in the roll bar frame and a 3/16" bolt through the canopy frame into the anchor nut. Very simply and works real good. the hinge line is 3" from the top of the door.

The bottom of the forward fuselage. On each side is a foam filler covered with fiberglass and epoxy. the space in the center is wher the cooling air will exit the cowling. It is 2" x 18" The foam has 2 layers of 3.8 ox. glass.
The anchor nuts you see in the center are for the rudder pedal mount. I used T-nuts for this.

In order to attach the cowling, I am making a flange from fiberglass that the cowl will be mounted to. In this picture I've attached a strip of 2mm plywood to the outside of the fuselage. Then I glued a 2mm strip to the inside to make the offset needed so the cowl will be flush with the finished sides of the fuselage.

The almost finished cowl mounting flange. I used 7 layers of 8.8 oz cloth to make it. I still need to do a bnit of trimming and sanding.

Thought you might like to see the rudder pedal system as I installed it. You can see that I am using a Cessna pedal setup. It was necessary to make a special recessed barcket to mount the brake cylinders since they mount about 3/4" below the floor line on the Cessna. The pedal assembly came from a 172. I rebuilt the whole thing with bushings where necessary. As you can see in the pictures above, the firewall is now in place.

Building the Spar and Wing

The spar jig is made from 3/4" plywood with triangular blocks holding it in place. We built a bench that is 25' long.

The Cavalier wing has spar flanges that are laminated. We used 5/16" thick plys.

Bottom flange just after the clamps were removed. I planed off the excess glue, etc. before removing it from the jig.

Bottom flange glued up. It takes alot of clamps

Top flange glued up.

This is the spar block for the landing gear mount. I used maple.

The spar with all blocking and intercostals in place. Ready for varnish.

Center section blocking.

Second skin ready to glue in place. Drain holes must be drilled in each bay.

May be the biggest job when building the spar is doing the taper. the spar flanges are tapered on the inside and in thickness to the tip.

The completed spar mounted into the fuselage. We glued rib O in place when the spar was in place to make sure that it matched the fuselage correctly. It did. You can also see in this picture that we have triangle blocks for the ribs glued in place. Things are starting to look a bit like an airplane at this point.

More soon.

Below are some pictures of the wing assembly. Including the basic stick and center controls

The wing all framed up and mated to the fuselage. A few minor pieces of spruce are still needed, before 2mm plywood skins are applied. Orginally, I had thouoght that I would not use wing tip tanks, but have now decided to go that way. Also, I changed the stick assembly and moved it behind the main spar. I think it simplifies the stick system.

Gear Mount assembly.

I needed to make a bellcrank assembly to get the push rod for the ailerons behind the gear legs. The yellow fitting is the flap horn.

Center part of the wing and control assembly. Also, the landing gear brackets I am using Grumman gear legs as you can see in the one picture. I used these gear legs on the other Cavalier, and I really like the way they perform. they absorb huge amounts of energy without springing you back into the air.

Building the ailerons. On the right, framing the ailerons. Below, the complete aileron ready for the leading edge. We are going to use foam and fiberglass. More on this later. Below is my version of the aileron hinges. I wanted to use a bearing type hinges to reduce wear and play.

The inboard aileron hinge. I am changing the push rod to be completely inside the wing. The rod end at the upper left of the component will accept the pushrod from inside the wing. On the other side is the arm that we will attach the lead weight for balancing the aileron. I calculate about 2 lbs of lead

Componests of the aileron hinges. I made blocks from 5/8" x 1" aluminium for the main body of the wing component. Drilles and taped a hole at 6 degrees to accept the rod end. these blocks get riveted between two alum. plates that will be mounted to the wing. The aileron component is the alum angle parts to the right in the picture. this style of hinge will make it possible to adjust the aileron after mounting.

During these winter months I've been working on things like the panel, tip tanks, flaps, and the engine. I'll have more pictures of this stuff soon.
We are going to use a Ez Pilot autopilot. The hole in the lower left is for the autopilot. Also, the panel is set up for a AVmap GPS, and a I-Comm Radio. The hole in the upper right is for the clock.
The panel with all avionics installed weighs 25 lbs.

   I thought I'd include a section on the time spent on building this plane. Ive recorded all the hours worked from the beginning, but I'm estimating the total for each job. I'll update from time to time as progress continues.

Building the fuselage. Jigging, framing, assembly                                           98
Turtle deck, canopy, vertical fin                                                                    66
Cabin doors framing, jigging, fiberglass work                                                 90              .
Windshield, firewall, and related                                                                    76
Metal fittings for wing mounts, engine mounts, rudder mounts and hinges         25
Horzintal stabilizer and rudder. Framing, jigging, skinning, etc                         60.
Building the sub spars, and main spar                                                           116
Wing assembly, rib cutting, etc.                                                                   105
Metral parts for the wing, including control assemblys                                     60
Ailerons, flaps spars and assembly                                                                 38
Instrument Panel, building and wiring                                                             25
Wing tip fuel tanks                                                                                         0
                                 Total hours worked to date                                      759 hours
     Total Cost to date: $6500.00
     Project was started on July 15, 2006

The wing framing is complete, and we are fitting the flaps and the ailerons. We are using slotted type flaps as you can see, and the ailerons are Frieze type. I changed the hinges for the ailerons so they can be adjusted. Also, the aileron balance is at the inboard hinge, (the green thing that sticks down). I decided to use fiberglass rather than 1.5mm plywood for the leading edge of the ailerons and flaps. Much easier, and faster to do.

These are the bottom skins for the wing. I am using 2mm 5 ply birch plywood. The openings are for inspection covers. I never liked using the 4" round inspection covers. Never enough room for your hands and tools. The covers will be made of .063 Alum.

Bottom skins installed along with the gear legs. Next step is installing the coving at the aileron and flaps. Big job.

The coving at the ailerons. this is done in 3 pieces, and using 1.5mm plywood. It was easy to bend these sections of plywood and to glue them in place. the cove at the flaps has a much sharper bend, and it was necessary to soak the plywood overnite before bending. For our exterior plywood, all nailing was done using nailing strips and when the glue set, all nails were removed. Alot of work, but I think worth the effort.

Fitting the coving at the flaps. The center (dark colored) section has been glued in place. We are fitting the outboard section. The inboard section will not be installed until the flap pushrod is fitted and we are sure everything is working correctly. Below, we have installed the blocking for the wingwalk area. the stringers are 1/2" x 5/8" spruce. We are using no plywood doublers in this area.

In the pictures below, you can see the rough cutout lightening holes in the wing skins. We used a router to cut the holes within about 1/4" of the desired size and then we finished the cutouts using a 1 1/2" drum sander to finish the openings. Works great. the scrap plywood will be used to make nailing strips for gluing skins in the future. As you can see, the interior of the wing is varnished. It's very important to make sure any area that is not easily accessable be varnished using at least two coats prior to applying the skin.

This picture taken on July 12, 2008, shows the wing and fuselage mated togther as we work on the bottom skins of the wing. I think we must have done things right because the wing fits perfectly to the fuselage.
We found that this is the best way to work on the bottom. A bit of a pain to set the wing on the fuselage upside down, but worth the effort.

The center section of the wing. All of the controls are installed, as well as the fuel lines, pitot lines and conduits for the wiring that goes into the wings. I realize tha using comduit is a bit heavier, but if any wiring needs to be added, it's difficult at best to rewire the wing.

Below you can see the auto pilot servos installed. We decided to switch to the EZ Pilot made by Trio Avionics. the picture on the left shows the altitude hold servo installed just behind number 3 bulkhead. this turned out to be a very easy installation. The AP control arm is not shown, but has been installed and removed. On the right is the wing leveler servo, that is installed in the left wing at the ailron bellcrank. I made an access panel for easy servicing. the control arm is not shown, but will attach at the small bolt just next to the push rod.

Installing the leading edge skins. I thought this was going to be a huge job but turned out to be rather easy. We soaked the 2mm 5 ply plywood for about 24 hours in water the bent the plywood over the ribs one rib further out the wing. This gave a slightly saller redius at the leading edge. We strapped the skins in place and let them dry prior to gluing. You can see, the leading edge is made up of 4 skins. After gluing the first skin in place, I glued a 2mm backer to the end of the skin. The first skin is sized to extend just beyond rib 3. The second skin is then glued in place and glued to the backer appplied to the first skin. I used small screws to hold the skin tight to the backer for a good glue joint. continued this untill all skins were glued in place. Notice we used bungy cords to hold the skins tight to the ribs. It is also necessary to use nails with nailing strips to hold the skin tightl until the glue drys. then all nails are removed from the wing surface.

The completed wing. All that's left to do is to do some minor filling at the scarf joints, and varnish. Three coats of varnish on all surfaces and structures are required. Small drain holes will be drilled in the lower inside corners of each bay.

The complete wing. Joe is doing some sanding prior to varnishing. In just a few days, the wing will be ready to cover. We have waited a long time for this day.

Covering begins. We are using the Stewart Systems covering process. This is a water based system that is very easy to use and gives good results if applied correctly. It is, however, different from other types of covering, and you need to take your time and learn how to use it.

We started with the bottom of the fuselage. The green areas are glued areas. We are using the 2.7 oz dacron cloth. Shown here we have bonded the fabric in place and completed the first shrinking process.
We made the 2x4 supports on the front so we could turn the fuselage very easily. this is important.

Below, the first side of the fuselage is covered, as well as one side of the fin. Unfortunately, weather turned cold and we were unable to complete the fuselage covering this fall.

Other Notes.

We have completed the covering of all the control surfaces and the flaps, ready to paint. I will include pictures of these later. One thing I have noticed, is when we are covering, it seams that each piece we do gets easier and turns out better. I suppose this is due to the learning curve. We have found the Stewart Systems to be pleasant to work with. No odors, no harmful chemicals. Water cleanup. Easy to master the techniques neccessary for a good job. Also, a bit less money, I believe.

Also this winter, I am working on finishing the wiring of the panel, making small parts such as cabin air intake vents, carb heat box, wheel pants and other parts.

Just a note about the cost of the plane.
To date, we have purchased everything to complete the plane with the exception of tires and tubes, upholstery and paint, plus a few minor items. Our cost including the engine and instruments to date is just under $18,000.00. This includes the Autopilot. The engine and instruments came from a wrecked C150. All the instruments were IFR certified and the engine had 300 hours since major. When we are finished, we estimate the total cost will be less than $20,000.00. Not bad, I think.

Since starting this site, I have had problems downloading pictures. Sometimes it works, other times no. For the last few months everytime I have tried to download pictures, my attempt fails. Yahoo says the site is working fine. I'm looking for some ideas. Maybe a new provider.
Also, the counter doesn't work.
Anyhow, we have been working on the plane at a good pace and now have the airframe covered and are ready to build the engine mount. The tip tanks are finished, as well as all the control surfaces and other parts. I wish I could get the pictures, but I will keep trying.

Updated: August 12, 2009 This site will be updated from time to time as work progresses. Visitors to this site: