I finished the gentle curve in the left longeron and clamped some 0.032″ scrap to the side to simulate the side skin.
I then laid the left side rail in place and clamped it flush with the edge of the scrap (plus a little to account for material removal when edge finishing the side rail) and drilled it to the longeron.
Next, I padded the jaws of the vise with some duct tape and clamped the longeron in place for the sharp downward bend 28 1/4″ after of the leading edge. I also clamped some scrap steel down to the top of the longeron to keep it from lifting as I perform the bend.
Here is the longeron after putting in the 5.6º downward bend.
The longeron also needs a 17º inward twist from this point forward. I used a large crescent wrench to give this a healthy twist. You have to apply significantly more twist than you need to account for springback.
In the end, I got 17.1º. Clamping the longerons to the upper engine mounts will lock in the final angle.
Here you can see that the downward bend in the longeron lines up precisely with the cut in the side skin.
My wife Jenn graciously agreed to help me get started riveting the tailcone. Here she is manning the rivet gun.
While I was sitting on a stool under the tailcone manning the bucking bar.
We got all of the rivets holding the bottom skin to F-707, F-708, and F-710 as well as the bottom skin to side skin joints. I still have to do the side skins to bulkheads and stringers as well as the rest of the rivets in F-711 and F-712 (the last two bulkheads).
Jenn really picked riveting up quick. Within just a few rivets, she was shooting them perfectly almost every time. I only had to drill out one rivet, and that was because I was holding the bucking bar slightly crooked. Like other builders, I had to upsize a few of the rivets by 1/2 size because the size specified on the plans was too short.
Before heading to bed, I finished up the gentle curve in the right longeron and match drilled it to the side rail. I’ll take care of the downward bend in the longeron tomorrow, then it’s on to the center section.
