Transition Training

A couple of weeks ago my family flew out to Vernonia, OR so that I could fly 3 days with Mike Seager. I know this sounds a little bit crazy, but up until this point I have never flown nor sat in an RV-10. I have gotten a bunch of crap on that, but for me the 10 was a pretty easy decision. I was looking to build so that I knew how every single airplane system and control (at least in the plane that I was flying) worked. On top of that I wanted something safe, fast, 4 seater with a good user following. Also, at this point I am 2 years and 2000 hours into the build. If I don't like how this thing flys, well, its too late for that ;)

N220RV. The funny thing about this plane is that I was supposed to fly with Mitch in this 3 years ago when he was on the East Coast and I was debating building a 10. At the time, Mitch was going through a panel upgrade, and then he ended up taking the Vans HQ job and moved West. I guess now is as good as time as any to fly 220RV.


Mike has access to a bunch of RVs!


I knew this was a grass strip, but it really is a grass strip! All of my soft field "training" has always been simulated soft field.


I didn't take too many photos of the actual training. We did take this one of Mt Saint Helens though!

 

So what did I learn? With my mission being that I am doing the final layout and setup of my interior and engine, are there things I do or don't want?

1. Seat Belt holder - I know this is a silly easy add, but an overhead hook to hold the front seat seat belts was a nice to have in 220RV.
2. Yaw Damper - I have gone back and forth on this. I decided to put the brackets in as I was building, but I was not sure if I was going to put a yaw damper in. I honestly think that out of all the planes I have flown (not a lot), the 10 had a tail that likes to yaw a lot. Maybe it was the wind. Maybe it was my justification for buying more Garmin stuff. The short of it is that I am putting a yaw damper in my 10 for the sake of my rear passengers (my daughter and my dog).
3. Flaps - The Dynon and Flap switch that was in 220RV was weird. The up position in the flaps was reflex. I couldn't or didn't want to get used to this. Up to me should be 0 degrees with reflex being an additional motion you do in cruise. When I got home I found in the VPX-Pro manual that the flap switch (momentary up and momentary down) default setting is to when you hit "UP" move to the 0 setting and while at 0 if you hit up again, -3. That to me makes sense.
4. Doors handle - The stock door handles are ok. What is not okay are those stock wonky safety latches. I ended up with a full plane around 180 degree kit, center cams, and low profile latches. I like my decision on that.
5. Overhead air - The front NACA vents do a good job of keeping your man parts well ventilated. The stock airframe is missing some air for your face. 

sb16-03-28

sb16-03-28.pdf

Service Bulletin 16-03-28 addresses the cracking of wing aft spar web at the inboard aileron hinge bracket attach rivets. In addition, for RV-10 aircraft, there is a potential for cracking of the flange bends of the inboard aileron hinge brackets.

I currently have the bottom skins off, but I am getting ready to close up the wings, so I needed to decide if I was going to complete this service bulletin or not. The service bulletin itself states that the brackets should be inspected for cracks, and ff no cracks are detected, re-inspect at every annual condition inspection or until the modifications required by this service bulletin have been completed. It is tempting though, with the wings in the stand and the bottom skins off to just go ahead and knock out this bulletin. The reason you would not do this, is that you do have to drill a bunch of rivets out of the spar. That has a potential to screw up the holes and ultimately make things worse.

In the end I decided to move forward with SB 16-03-28. I started by taping everything off and trying to grind one of the rivet heads flush with the bracket. The thought on this was that you cannot miss the #30 hole if you are never drilling into it. While this seemed like a good idea, it took some pretty good effort to knock out the rivet after the head was ground off (the nice part about this is that you end up trashing the previous brackets, so you can grind into them all you want as long as you don't hit the spar)






After the first rivet removal in that technique I decided to go back to the tried and true method of just drilling out the rivet heads, breaking them off, and then punching the rest of the rivet out of the hole. I did get a little over ambitious with the grinder and touched one of the rivets that did not need to come out. I later drilled that out and replaced it.


With the heads broken off all of the rivets and a #40 drilled about half way into the rivet, the whole bracket pops off.


While this makes it look like I jacked up all of the holes, the dark shaded region is just sharpie from the original fit up. I was able to get everything drilled out without the drill bit ever touching the spar.




I forgot to take a photo with the bottom doublers in place, but I would definitely recommend going for the service bulletin if you are still sitting in the wing stands with the bottom skins off. This was an easy one.

Moving Day!

The time has come to move the plane out of the garage and into the hangar. We are pretty excited because we are not just going to a hangar, we are going to the EAA 186 Build Hangar. It will be nice to have the EAAs wealth of knowledge looking and criticizing the plane as the build continues.



The chapter had a converted boat trailer that we borrowed in order to move the plane. I was going to have a roll back come and pick it up, but in the end I decided I wanted to be responsible for the move and I also wanted to be able to load and unload at my own pace. This worked out even better than expected because my dad was in town to help with the process!



We got really lucky on the load. If you look carefully, the trailer in this position had the plane load in a level position. i.e. no incline to go up!



The drive was probably more stressful than the actual loading and unloading.



Time lapse of the load and unload:

MT Governor stud length

Previously I had installed my MT-860-3 but noticed that the studs were a little on the long side. I tried screwing them in a little further, but it felt like they were already bottomed out.

Here you can see that the stud threads are obviously too long to the point where there is non-threaded area showing past the governor.



Jeff Schans at Thunderbolt sent me next day a variety of stud lengths to rectify this. On the bottom is the original stud followed by some of the replacement options that Thunderbolt sent to me.



One thing I noticed as I was going through this exercise was that upon removal the threaded blind hole in the case was actually a lot deeper than I thought it was. So rather than swapping out the studs, I set the existing stud a little deeper and all was well. Sorry for the run-around Thunderbolt. Thanks for working with me.



Now back to research on the 860-3. I noticed that everyone seems to be using the 860-5 now. I have to go find out if I need to swap this out.

MT 15" spinner clearance

Previously I measured and posted the distances from the spinner to the crank flange for the MT-12-B. The issue with the previous post was that I had assumed that the MT-12-B came with a 15" spinner to fit my showplanes cowl. Once I started to fit things I noticed that the diameters did not add up and the mistake was that the "default" when you order a 12-B prop is that it comes with a P-469-1 spinner. The correct part number for the 15" spinner is P-285-1-A. Also, because I special ordered mine as Matte Black, this is a no-stock item. :(

The difference is significant!


The new clearance measurement are inline with the trusty internet posts.
 

I have my starter ring gear off for the cowl fit/installation and I also took the spinner to cowl gap out of the mockup plate distance rather than putting spacers on the cowl. For my records here is my horrible hand writing tracking the crank flange to spinner distance. I may increase this gap to more than 1/8" but for now here is my mockup target number:

Vertical Power

I was about to place a digi-key order a couple of weeks ago in order to buy the molex crimper for the vertical power molex connectors when I came across a document on the vertical power website that stated Vertical Power has molex (professional series) crimpers available for free rental. I figured it was one of those marketing lines that when you try to actually contact them they either ignore you or tell you that they don't have anything available.

To my surprise I was completely wrong. They shipped the crimper out the day after I contacted them, and here I am 1 week later with all of my connectors done!

March Status Photos

I have spent a good amount of time getting my panel console fitted. Everything for the most part goes right in, but there are minor cosmetic tweaks and fitting that does need to happen. It is good to see the panel looking like a panel!


As of now, I have the VPX, GTR-20, GSU primary and backup, GEA24 and the AUX fuse block mounted.


Looking back I have a mess!


The engine is coming together nicely. I got my exhaust from Vetterman and they did a wonderful job.


I have the doors complete, but I am waiting on the weather to warm up a bit before I finish cutting my plexi-glass.


Side view






I did notice that the desiccant on a couple of cylinders was starting to go clear. I replaced all of the desiccant in the plug adapters just to get ahead of that.



I have Beringer nosewheel and mains. I am waiting on the weather to warm to finishing dura-coating some of the wheel components.




I have spent a lot of time going through this door. My neighbor caught me the other day in the tail of the plane and I told them that I would be out in a minute because I was a little stuck at that point in time. They responded with "Looks like you should have built it a little bigger." If only it was that easy.