Fuselage - AFT Section

2005-07-17 - AFT Fuselage Assembly. (4.0 Hrs).

You know how you work on parts for several weeks, or even months, and then, all of a sudden, everything gets assembled, and you feel like you finally accomplished something? Well, this was one of those days! After finishing-up the last few J-Channels, I got to assemble the aft fuselage. This was a good day.

Starting with the F-778 Aft Bottom Skin, cleco on the two middle bulkheads, F-707 and F-708.
Slide-in the J-Channels.
Add the right F-773 side skin.
Now the left F-773 side skin.
Cleco on the F-706 bulkhead assembly.
Spend 20 minutes futzing with the tailcone assembly.
Figure out that you can't get the J-Channels through the F-710 bulkhead with the tailcone assembly on, so remove the tailcone assembly, slide in the F-710 bulkhead, and slide the tailcone assembly back on. Swear a little.
And that's how you assemble the aft fuselage. Well, the bottom pieces, at least.
Van was pretty adamant about making sure that there is no twist in the fuselage before drilling the J-Channels, so I did the plumb bob thing. Make sure the fuselage is level, then hang the plumb bob from the top tooling hole, and make sure that the tip of the plumb bob is centered on the bottom tooling hole. The F-707 bulkhead looks good.
And, the F-708 bulkhead looked good, also. I declare that I have a straight fuselage, without any twist.