I’ve had the tailcone finished for many years now and I’ve been waiting for a good time to complete the 08-6-1 service bulletin from Vans. The service bulletin is for possible cracks in the F-1010 bulkhead and calls for adding doublers. I needed to add an antenna doubler to the belly of the rear tail [...]
Finished the vertical stabilizer top fairing today. It turned out the best of all the fairings. I guess it’s because of all the prior practice on the other fairings. This is the last of the empennage kit. Nothing more to do but wait for the wings to get here. Should be around the 2nd week [...]
Finished up the Rudder tip fairing seams. Unlike the top rudder fairing, which needed a lot of fill work, the bottom was pretty good. Not much filler needed on this one. Time to store the Rudder away. All that’s left is the Vertical Stabilizer tip fairing.
Finished up the Horizontal Stabilizer tip fairing seams. Turned out pretty good. The more I do this process, the better I get at it. I probably couldn’t fab an entire speedboat out of glass, but… Time to store the HS away.
I fabricated a mounting plate for the tail-strobe. It matches the shape of the bottom rudder fairing. I used JB Weld to fix the nuts in position on the inside portion of the mounting plate. This will allow the tail-strobe to be removed for maintenance. The mounting plate was primered and mounted to the bottom [...]
Finished the rudder top fairing. Still need to do the bottom rudder fairing after I get the mounting hole for the tail-strobe light cut out. Also finished up the left elevator fairing and started the left tip fairing of the horizontal stabilizer. Wing kit is expected on May 9th, so I need to get these [...]
Received the Whelen tail light strobe in the mail the other day. This will allow me to complete the bottom rudder fairing along with the rest of them. I need to order some electrical tools (which I’ll need eventually anyway) to extend the wiring so I can have a disconnect near the front of the [...]
Wow, the whole process turned out really good on the elevator seams. I felt it was going to be fine, but I’m even more satisfied now that there’s primer on it and it looks great. After the first coat of primer I lightly sanded with 220 sandpaper then put another coat of primer on. I’ll [...]
The right side fairings on the horizontal stabilizer are filled, glassed, filled, and ready for a shot of primer to see how they came out. Looks like they’ll turn out pretty good. I’ll move on to the left side after these are primed. Wanted to try everything out on one side first. You learn quick [...]
More sanding work on the fairing seams. On the right is a pic of the elevator after sanding the first coat of filler. West Systems 410 fills nice and sand like a charm. Glad I’m using it. The pic to the left shows the horizontal fairing gap finished off and sanded. The gap between the [...]
