This week I finished the fuselage sides. This weekend we’re starting the fuselage assembly. My plan is to glass he bulkheads as they’re needed in chapter 6, so I can cut the foam to make sure everything fits before glassing. Not sure it’ll make a big difference, but I think it might save some sanding.

I’ve also made my temp firewall and frame to hold everything together. Pics to come.

Today Karina and I laid up the interior sides of the fuselage. The past couple of weeks were spent shaping the foam leading up to this layup. For the jig I used some old pine boards in my lumber loft, and, instead of Masonite as mentioned in the plans, I used some stiff foam board I found on sale at Michaels. I did this because the local home improvement store was out of Masonite. The foam board worked great and was very easy to work with. It was also only $4 for the whole jig!

The fuselage sides are exact to the plans, except I made the round indentions for the control stick slightly oversized.

Today I laid up F28 and the longerons. I did these two first because I don’t have enough BID to do any of the other bulkheads. Also, I’m going to vacuum bag most of the bulkheads, and since this one is small I could do it without giving up much weight. It’s also not particularly visible in the finished plane, so I felt like if I made a mess of it with my first layup of the plane, I wouldn’t see it in the end.

With the longeron, I found it really easy to hold against the jigs. some other builders had mentioned needing multiple clamps, but mine only needed the two pictured here. I also put a few weights (buckets of concrete) to hold the plywood flat. I put a few screws in to hold the longerons in place, but in the end they weren’t necessary.

Here’s the longerons:

And here’s F28: