ETLB Squawk Forums — Archive

This will be my third scratch built aircraft. Bone stock no frills himax with rotax 277, with possible streamlining later on for better fuel consumption. Here is the vertical stab and rudder from teams starter kit. This is the light tail for ultralights, I figured If I could build this the rest of the kit would be easy.

After I complete the tail I will try to source my wood locally, If I can't find decent wood I might keep buying kits. My wood working arsenal.

The hard part to building an airplane is to make it fun and break each project into neat little steps. if you think about the big picture you will get confused. the easiest way I have learned to finish a big project is to do something everyday, even if its as simple as pulling staples, its progess on a dream that most people will never realize.your dream won't come true unless you chip away everyday pulling staples out of the wood.

I agree with keep making small steps every day. But there is always a larger context to those small steps so as to make sure you do not blindly step into a dead end alley (thinking of a scene near the end of Animal House here...).

I am helping a group of Boy Scouts build a Solar Regatta boat. We have no plans, everything is rather from scratch. The rear is a catamaran with cross beams. Due to a lack of forward context I have just found the rudder pushrods do not have a straight run to the rudder horn. So either the pushrods get a kink OR I modify the cross beams to spread the rear hulls a bit.

Just an example of why you do need to spend some cycles looking at that big picture  

Cut my first piece of metal and also made the first mistake. The rudder hinges are cut from square steel tubing but not realizing there should be two different size pieces of tubing so one hinge can fit inside the other I cutout the first two pieces thinking the hinges were all the same size. They didn't give enough extra to make mistakes but I would need to buy more anyway to make the elevator hinges.

Does the hinge at the bottom of the rudder need to be installed before the rs535 plywood goes on? Looks like it would be nearly impossible to get to the nut that holds the hinge on.

After a trial fit it looks like I should be able to access the nut with a pair of needle nose pliers.

Looking good. And dont worry about having to redo parts when i order material i plan for a little extra for a goof up and redo.

It was certainly straying from plans, but I did my light tail hinges using square tubing of the same size. To make it work, and it has, I "nested" the "U" channels together side-by-side and did 2 offset one direction and the 3rd one to the other side, to stop side-to-side motion on the elevator and up-and-down on the rudder. Maybe the rudder just has 2 hinges, I forget, but I did offset the nested tubing parts in opposite directions. I don't know if my written description makes any sense?

Lynn

I strayed from the plans too but only after learning a lesson and when I got tired of looking at my half painted half rusting hinges , I took a strap of stainless steel, bent it into a U  shape and made new hinges out of it, no paint and shiny forever.

Quoted from lake_harley It was certainly straying from plans, but I did my light tail hinges using square tubing of the same size. To make it work, and it has, I "nested" the "U" channels together side-by-side and did 2 offset one direction and the 3rd one to the other side, to stop side-to-side motion on the elevator and up-and-down on the rudder. Maybe the rudder just has 2 hinges, I forget, but I did offset the nested tubing parts in opposite directions. I don't know if my written description makes any sense?

Lynn

Your idea is how I thought it went together at first.

This might be a dumb question but does the horizontal stabilizer rear u-channel spar cover the whole length of the stabilizer? Looks like it could be built with two sides with what looks like a hunk of tapered pine glued in the middle for strength.  

I don't know what could be done, but I built mine with the caps as full width. The 1.5MM ply had to be done with 2 pieces, unless you can find it in a long enough piece. All I found available was 4' X 4' sheets of the 1.5MM from Wicks. They're only about 2 hours away from me so I bought all of my plywood from them.

BTW...George's suggestion of forming the hinge parts from stainless steel is an excellent. I had stainless in my shop left over from other fabrication work but didn't take the time to bend up the channels. Now I have to keep after the rust issue with steel hinges.

Lynn

Quoted from lake_harley I don't know what could be done, but I built mine with the caps as full width. The 1.5MM ply had to be done with 2 pieces, unless you can find it in a long enough piece. All I found available was 4' X 4' sheets of the 1.5MM from Wicks. They're only about 2 hours away from me so I bought all of my plywood from them.

BTW...George's suggestion of forming the hinge parts from stainless steel is an excellent. I had stainless in my shop left over from other fabrication work but didn't take the time to bend up the channels. Now I have to keep after the rust issue with steel hinges.

Lynn

for such detailed plans I would think the builders manual could be better! which is why I am asking for help. I plan on sealing all steel parts with rustoleum when the weather warms up.

Stainless is largely discouraged in aircraft construction because it has a greater tendency to crack than mild steel.

There's also almost as many grades of stainless steel as there are aluminium grades. Some are tough, but some are soft & prone to wear in the bolt holes. Some are hard, & prone to cracking: some even rust. Some are magnetic, others aren't, which demonstrates the variability in the constituents of the material.

So you really need to know what grade of stainless you're using, & whether its properties are suitable for the application you plan to use it in.

Bruce

These type of u brackets are commonly used on tube and sail ultralights on airframe, control surfaces hinges , cable tangs, stainless steel 304 grade , you can see them in every ultralight parts catalog available off the shelf

Not a whole lot progress, but progress in my mind. Almost finished with the rudder and fin. Got my 18 foot building table cleaned off, and ordered the full size blueprints. My hats are off to you if you can build this whole plane with just the downloaded plans  

Thats a good start. Keep it up

Quoted from cdlwingnut Thats a good start. Keep it up

Thanks  

Just a little update, The Price for all the plywood needed to complete the plane comes in around $800 from AC not including ups freight. Lowes lumber doesn't look real promising in the lengths required for the wings spars and fuselage so I am ordering that too since I have to pay a premium for freight shipping anyway. 4x8 sheets of ply have to be shipped ups freight.

Check local lumber yards. I got real baltic birch in 5'×5' sheets for a good price same stuff as acs

Quoted from 509 Just a little update, The Price for all the plywood needed to complete the plane comes in around $800 from AC not including ups freight. Lowes lumber doesn't look real promising in the lengths required for the wings spars and fuselage so I am ordering that too since I have to pay a premium for freight shipping anyway. 4x8 sheets of ply have to be shipped ups freight.

Aluminum tubes for struts is one item you can order from ACS along with plywood, to economize on shipping costs. (If  you do not already have them.)

Awhile ago I made an account how much it would take to build another minimax on the cheap.
I came up with about $250 for wood with a combination of fir floor boards for spar caps and longerons and pine for the rest.
The plywood was $120 for 3 sheets of 1/8 Okoume ,  and $320 for all birch plywood from Aircraft spruce.
That puts all air-frame wood at $ 690, Only the birch ply would have to be shipped for about $120 UPS.
I wish  I had the price for the aluminum also but I didn't have the patience to add it all up.

Quoted from 71 Awhile ago I made an account how much it would take to build another minimax on the cheap.
I came up with about $250 for wood with a combination of fir floor boards for spar caps and longerons and pine for the rest.
The plywood was $120 for 3 sheets of 1/8 Okoume ,  and $320 for all birch plywood from Aircraft spruce.
That puts all air-frame wood at $ 690, Only the birch ply would have to be shipped for about $120 UPS.
I wish  I had the price for the aluminum also but I didn't have the patience to add it all up.

Good info george, I miss quoted my original price of the ply from AC came out to slightly less than $700. I may have been too cheap when I built my skypup, I bought wood from ac for the spars but some of the wood I used in the fuselage longerons was questionable and I always flew that plane like I had splinters in my butt. I was 25 years old at the time. I have since made it a mantra, my life is worth more than just saving a little money.

I sawed up my first piece of lumber today, a pine 2x4. I was quite surprised how much material was actually usable. Mostly rs17 members and some thicker pieces for spars. This material will be used in the horizontal stab and elevator. The piece of wood on the far right that is darker in color is some old growth lumber I had in storage, I counted 30 growth rings in a one inch piece, the grain is so tight it won't show up on camera. All of the main spars in the wing and tail will be spruce.

Just a slight caution......you have some pretty wavy grain right there......as that wood dries out you MAY end up with some twisted and bent pieces......

I have been told by others who have much more experience and qualifications than I do that if there is a question, just throw the piece away and get a better one.

I'm sure some of the others can chime in.

Quoted from streffpilot Just a slight caution......you have some pretty wavy grain right there......as that wood dries out you MAY end up with some twisted and bent pieces......

I have been told by others who have much more experience and qualifications than I do that if there is a question, just throw the piece away and get a better one.

I'm sure some of the others can chime in.

thanks for the heads up, streff.

Making more rs parts on the table saw.

Got my five gallon tank from ul builder.my plywood and 12 foot spars should arrive shortly. .8mm ply is out of stock.

Hey, gj, if you resize your pics before posting, it stops the page going huuge so you don't have to scroll sideways to read it

Are you sawing your wood from house framing grade  2x4s ?