Fuselage

Well, at long last, the fun is beginning with this center section. I figured out the best way to rivet it all together. I think. We'll see how this goes. I started with the crotch strap brackets. I pulled the seat ribs and riveted this all together on the bench. With the right combination of rivet sets in the squeezer, this was a piece of cake. All of the rivets could be reached with the squeezer.

They look great, don't they?

Once the brackets were riveted on, I clecoed one pair of seat ribs at a time to the bulkhead. Even with the brackets riveted in place, the seat ribs could be gently pushed aside to get the rivet gun in there and set these rivets. I removed all the other ribs to give even better access.

When the two pairs of ribs were riveted in place, I added the rest, one at a time. They were even easier. This all went together without any trouble.

You can't really see the rivets, but they all turned out real good. I came back to this later and added all the bolts, washers, and nuts to the seat ribs. I'll torque them down and seal them tomorrow.

Moving right along, I clecoed the F-705 bulkhead to the aft ends of the seat ribs and began riveting it all together. This can be a bit tricky because some of these ribs terminate at the F-705, while others have baggage ribs connected on the other side. There are different size rivets used all throughout. Some can be squeezed, some have to be hammered, so you have to pay attention to details.

I got all the seat ribs, except the two on the outer sides that you see clecoes in, riveted in place. The two center baggage area ribs are also riveted on, as you can see. At this point, I don't want to rivet the other baggage ribs on until I make a decision about whether or not to make the baggage floor removeable, or not. If so, it will involve installing a lot of nutplates and this would be much easier before those ribs are riveted in place here.

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