Fuselage

Today I fabricated the short angles that go with the brake pedals, and continued work on the assembly.

I didn't take a lot of pictures of the process, but here are the completed brake pedal assemblies. A lot of careful work went into these. The angles have been fab'd and deburred, everything is drilled together, and the deburring and countersinking is completed. Basically, these are ready to rivet together. Normally, this is the time to prime. But I've been mulling this over. I don't think I want to paint my brake pedals right now. I'm not sure yet what color I want for my interior anyway. So I'm putting this off for a bit until I decide what I'm going to do.

Meanwhile, there's plenty of work to do to keep me busy. The center block was drilled, then cut in half with the band saw. I drilled all the bolt holes in the plastic blocks (no pics, sorry) on the drill press. Then I was trying to figure out the best way to drill them to the F-719 longeron angles. Basically, I'm borrowing Dan Checkoways method to drill them to the F-719's in several places. This is done by unclecoing the 719's, removing them from the fuselage, and drilling them on the bench. I carefully measured and marked the 3" minimum distance from the firewall before taking them out of the fuse.

Then I measured and marked for the other holes. I will have 3 locations for the rudder pedal blocks. My friend Mike Bullock has an excellent description of the method I followed here. Double-clamping them to the bench was the best way to drill the blocks to the F-719's. They lay flat on the bench, which simulates them laying next to the skin while drilling these holes.

Once the holes were drilled, the F-719's were re-installed back in the fuse and everything clecoed back together. Then I lifted the rudder pedal assembly into place and bolted it temporarily in place. How exciting, to see rudder pedals in place in my airplane. Even if they are upside down!

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