As I’m writing this as evident by the date it’s mid-May. The video and the work covered here is a bit of a look back over the work accomplished to this point. I’m focusing a lot of my work during this time on the flight controls and reading ahead to try to get as much work done ahead of putting the side skins on. I’d rather spend a little extra time here where I can work on the center portion of the fuselage with the skins off than after the skins go on and I’m then needing to spend my time working with my head upside down working on the items in the airplane.

My father-in-law Harold has even over lending a hand on the misc items needing to be put together. The throttle quadrant, front and rear seats has been something he’s been assembling with some help from me. I’m going to send my throttle quadrant off to Midwest Panels to have them powder coat it with their treatment. I wish the throttle quad had flush screws instead of screws that are raised. That’ll be a project for another day but not right now as that’s something I’ll stick to the plans on.

I also have spent a fair amount of time working on running some aluminum fuel lines over the rubber ones as the rubber ones need to be replaced in five years. It would be nice if Sling had an upgrade option for this as an offering but I get why they go with the rubber lines. If I can’t get the aluminum lines to work the way I want then I’ve been in conversations with a company about building some teflon lines. The cost for the Teflon over the aluminum is probably about 4x the cost… but honestly having.a fuel line leak in the cabin isn’t super high on my list.

Once I can overcome these items that consume a fair amount of time to get right I’m hoping I can move along quicker. As of today I received all the items to complete all the avionics. I am hoping to hear about the firewall forward being delivered here soon as I really need the fuel selector to be able to install the fuel lines all the way. It hasn’t been revealed to me yet as to why some of the order of materials are delivered because I would think you should get everything to complete the center portion of the fuselage before the side skins go on. Hopefully I’m not building myself into a corner somewhere.

I called today to get the technical counselor out to inspect the rear fuselage so I can work on getting the skin on that part of the plane. That would be another good milestone. I just want to make sure that section is 100% correct before I complete that phase. Once it’s on, it’s on.

I do have the part to resolve the wing hing issue which prevented me from completing the flaps and ailerons. Once we wrap up the seats on the bench, we’ll get the bench cleared off so we can get the wing up on the bench, skin removed, hinge replace, skin re-attached, wingtip back on, flaps/ailerons aligned and the fuel tank attached. Then we’ll attach the other fuel tank and we’ll be complete with the wings and I can focus everything onto the fuselage.

Much of April was spent on working on the flight controls.  More than I really anticipated really.  I think I'm pretty close on where things need to be as far as the fluidity of the controls.  I did join the rear fuselage and the center fuselage together as part of this process.  I was concerned about additional binding that might occur with the addition of the side skins and other twisting that may go on when joining the center fuselage and rear fuselage together, so before I riveted the controls into place I moved everything off the bench with the side skins on.  I think I'm in good shape here.

The upgrade brakes/wheels and stainless steel lines arrived during the past few weeks, so I'm ready to get those installed - and looking forward to it.  But I'm tidying up loose ends here and there.  It took me several passes to get the writing in the rear fuselage just right but I think I've got it set now.  Next up I need to finish up is the pitot static line, the comm wiring and ELT wiring so I can close out the rear fuselage.

Also, it's important to note that I plan on engaging and having over the local tech counselor to review my work prior to closing out anything major like the rear fuselage.  After all - I only want to do this once!

I also had the first go at fitting the side skins on.  They go on quite well and I look forward to riveting them on, but until I have all of the items needing done prior to this I'll endeavor to get as much done as I can before I complete that step.

The project as a whole doesn't "feel" like it's moving as quickly as before - simply because I think the parts I'm working on now are much more nuanced in nature.

With regards to the wing hinge needing to be replaced.  I have the part here now.  The plan of action going forward is to get the fuselage onto the wheels.  I'm using the bench time to complete items like assembling the seats and the throttle quadrant.  Once I've got those items done and the bench is cleared off I'll get the wing back up there to remove the skin, fix the hinge and put it back together.  Once that is done, the bench can be pushed back against the wall where it normally lives when not building an airplane.  This will allow for more room for the plane, now (when it's done) being on wheels with the engine mount on the front end.  This will make the overall length too long to fit in the garage without it being at a diagonal position.  So that's going to take a bit of doing to finagle this together in the space of time needed to do the nose wheel.

Best laid plans eh?  Wish me luck.