After sorting out the rear spar elevator notches, we started riveting using the NEW pneumatic riveter! It took a while to get here, but I’m really glad we spent the money for it. It made quick work of riveting the rear spare 603PPs to the reinforcing bars (609PPs).
The beauty of it is that all of the rivets look identical, and perfect!
Here you can see 8 rivets attaching a hinge to the spar. I’m holding a -4 rivet gauge over the shop head to check that it’s been compressed enough, which it has.
The reinforcing bar-to-spar work amounted to 124 rivets, mostly AN470AD4-6, with a few -7s and -5s thrown in. The plans called for -5’s for the 2 outer hinge attachments, but when I went to set the first one, it looked too long. Sure enough, it didn’t set properly, which means I’ll have to drill it out.
I changed to -4’s for the rest and it worked out just fine (the picture with the blue gauge shows one set of the hinges with the -4’s used).
The shop heads (front side of rivets) look really cool against the spars:
Overall it was a great afternoon riveting. We found that the riveting part is the quick part. It’s preparing all the pieces TO be riveted that takes a bulk of the time. Next up, we’ll be riveting the front spar of the horizontal stabilizer! But first, I have to order a rivet removal tool and a small torque wrench.
