Wing - Left Flaps and Ailerons

2004-06-12 - Flap and aileron preparation. (5.5 Hrs).

Today, I did the 6.3° bend in FL-706B and match-drilled it to the inboard flap rib. I, also, spent a few more hours deburring the rest of the flap and aileron parts.

Start by clamping the FL-706A angle to FL-706B. Do a little better job of aligning the two pieces than this picture shows.

Note, pictures are sometimes taked out-of-sequence and do not necessarily represent the actual steps taken to complete a task.

Drill-a-hole, insert-a-cleco, Drill-a-hole, insert-a-cleco, etc. Use FL-706A as a guide to draw a line on the back of FL-706B where they form an angle. This is the bend line.
Bend the FL-706B to exactly 6.3°. A lot of sites made a big deal out of this, since FL-706B is so thick. Really, it ain't that big-a-deal. First, I tried bending this with my working bench vice, but the jaws just wouldn't hold. So, I used my drill-press vice, standing on end on the floor. I used my lead-weighted dimpling hammer to just wack it a few times, and it came out perfect--exactly 6.3°. I'll bet Van's tech writer got a big laugh when they wrote "6.3 degrees" in the manual.

BTW, if you happen to bend FL706B the wrong way, just lay it aside, get the part for the other wing, and use it. The parts for each wing are exactly the same, but they are bent in opposite directions.

Cleco the two pieces back together, and cleco the assembly to the flap end rib and the flap spar. Then use the FL-706B as a guide to drill all of the holes in the rib.
Drill-a-hole, insert-a-cleco, Drill-a-hole, insert-a-cleco, etc.
Everything fits great.
Next, you need to drill holes for the platenut that goes inside the inboard flap rib. Also, the hole that is there is 1/8", and it needs to be enlarged to 1/4". I looked all over for the K1000-4 platenut that goes here. There is no K1000-4 on the inventory sheet. Eventually, I found the two platenuts in the bottle that I used to store the parts from bag 1992-2, "Misc. Wing Platenuts."

Coincidentally, I also found a bag with four pieces of 2 1/2 x 2 3/4 x 040 aluminum, which should have been used to make the A408 aileron spar reinforcement plates.

Here's the otherside with a 1/4" bolt inserted. Note, that the forward rivet goes through FL-706B, the rib, and the platenut.
There are two 3/32" holes in the front of all of the flap ribs where they attach to the flap spar. These are attached with LP4-3 blind rivets, which require a 1/8" hole. You really need at least two holes or a clamp to accurately match-drill parts. Therefore, I drilled a third hole in the middle of each rib and the spar so I would have an extra hole for a cleco while I enlarged each hole. Notice, two silver clecos, and one copper cleco. I'll probably just put three LP4-3 rivets per rib.
Don't forget to cut and drill the shims that go under the rear of the two end flap ribs. These are found in the bag 825-2.
All nicely drilled, rounded, and deburred. They say IB (inboard) and OB (outboard), but they are almost identical. Probably should be identical.