Nov 7 -- Start Right Elevator

RV-9s are noted for "tail wagging" in rough air, so someone is developing a solution in the form of a rudder trim tab and electronic controller. I heard about this within a day of starting to skin the rudder, and decided to set the rudder aside in order to wait and see what the options are. Products such as this take an order of magnitude longer to develop than predicted, so I may well finish the rudder without a trim tab. However it doesn't cost anything to wait a while...

Spent a good share of the day getting started on the right elevator. Cut stiffeners to length, then trimmed to shape, match drilled them, deburred both the stiffeners and elevator skin, removed plastic protective coating (stiffeners only), used Coleman fuel to remove plastic covering residue, and finally dimpled the stiffeners. I will need an end person to help with skin dimpling, so that waits for another day.

The photo sequence does a good job of showing how things progress from parts covered in blue plastic to (in this instance), parts such as stiffeners that are dimpled and almost ready for primer.

Of course I really should have been working on...work. I am such a slacker.

Time: 5.0 hours. (Yes, this took a whole lot longer than it appears.)