Dave's Sonex Builders Log

I completed deburring the right hand aileron and moved back to the left aileron. The first step was to mark the small flange so that I could determine what overlap I would have. I looks like I\’m shy about 1/64th from the 1/4 inch edge distance that I would like to achieve. Next I marked the hinge and drilled most of the the pilot holes. I left out the one at the middle rib and the ones at the counterbalance ribs. I\’ll mark and drill these while transferring the holes from the hinge to the skin. I transferred all of the holes in the hinge to the skin. Next, I marked and added the holes through the each of the ribs.

Re-drilling pilot holes up to #30

Tonight I worked at completing the pilot holes for the hinge in the aileron skin. I pretty much completed all of the pilot holes. I discovered there was one left when I took apart the aileron. My next step will be to enlarger all the holes to #30.

Drilled the pilot holes in one hinge and then started to transfer the holes to the small flange on the skin.

Tonight I removed the clecos so that I could check the overlap of the skin before drilling the hinge. I have found in the past that one of the control surface skins did not have the correct overlap and I did not end up with the correct edge distance. This one seems pretty close. I think I will move the holes about 1/64th closer to the edge of the hinge to provide the best edge distance for both the hinge and the skin.

I continue to work on the aileron assembly, drilling pilot holes and laying out the holes on the skin. I completed all of the pilot holes in the left aileron skin and clecoed it together. Next I cleaned up and move on to the right aileron skin. I finished all the pilot holes in this skin as well. I should say all the pilot holes except for the hinge on both ailerons. That\’ll be for another day.

Aileron Rib 1 – Trace and cut out blank 2 – Drill hole for radius before notching 3 – Trim notch and then file edges to side. 4 – Form angles Aileron Skin 1 – Trim longest cut edge to exact size. 2 – Clean up front edge (shortest edge) 3 – File angle at trailing edge to match tip rib. 4 – Trim the lower edge of the aileron skin to meet the front and back. Clean up the edges and check the fit of the tip rib. After completing the tip rib and aileron skin I started to layout the rivet holes. I started do drill the holes for the counterbalance ribs but I discovered that I need a long drill bit.

Tonight I cut out and formed a new aileron tip rib based on the new drawing I created using my 3D model of the aileron skin. Wow, it fits great. I still need to do a bit of work on trimming the skin but the rib seems to fit great.

Started to cut out the Aileron Skin