Access cover and more countersinking
First, a lesson. Bill had asked me earlier this week to come over and check out his riveting job and while over there I was thinking about the little rivet gauges you get with your Avery kit that allow you to check the amount the rivet is mashed. You don't want to under mash it or over mash it. The gauge just has a notch cut out. Then it dawned on me.. what do you do about measuring dimpled holes? That would make the rivet stick up a little more. I had no idea. Well, Bill clued me in. The rivet gauge has a hole on one end that you use when measuring rivets that are in dimpled holes. (I thought it was there just to tie them together if you wanted. DUH!) BTW, rivets should be compressed 1.5 times their diameter.

Rivet gauges

Anyways.. tonight I put on the tank access cover plate. A rubberized cork gasket is used to seal the plate to the rib. Apparently it is common for this to starat leaking after awhile so many builders proseal it on as a preventative measure. Of course, this makes it difficult to remove if necessary. I confirmed with Van's about the leaking and they said that yes, sometimes it is a problem. For now, I prosealed under the screw heads and will leak test the tank. If it passes, then I will proseal around the edges of the cover as preventative maintenance.

Access cover/root end of tank
Baffle in place

I also spent some time countersinking the spar tonight.

(Time: 2 hours)

- posted by Matthew @ 11/20/2003 11:12:22 PM