Fuel Tank Test, Wing Conduit and Bottom Skins

Fuel Tank Test

One fairly critical component of the QB inspection includes testing of the fuel tank for any leaks.  These tanks are notoriously challenging to build and get sealed up, luckily Vans does this for you on the quickbuild but highly suggests you test them yourself.  To accommodate this Vans sends you a testing kit with your shipment.  Since I removed the tanks from the wings to inspect it makes it fairly painless to run the suggested tests.  I did have to reach out to the VAF forum with a few questions about the process.  There are several methods you can use to test the tanks but I decided to go with the one the kit is for.  One issue that wasn't clear to me was the kit requires you to have the tank fuel filter installed to use one of the caps. Once that was figured out the rest went smoothly.

Tester Kit Parts

The picture above shows the parts of the testing kit; fill stem you screw on, cap for the fuel filter and a balloon cable tied to the tank vent line.  Now the purpose of the balloon is to ensure you don't over pressurize the tank, so if it pops then that's too much pressure... if it doesn't fill then you have a big leak somewhere.  I used an air compressor turned down to the lowest PSI setting to fill, would fill for about 5 seconds and wait and repeat until the balloon was inflated.  Then it's like testing a tire, you just spray soapy water all over the place and look for bubbles.   The only bubbles I had were around the balloon since the cable tie wasn't air tight. Happy to saw that both tanks passed their tests and are ready to be reinstalled onto the wings.

Wing Conduit

The subject of conduit for both the wings and the fuselage is something that I really struggled with.  Searching the internet you find that everyone does it a bit different and some don't do it at all.  For me this plane I plan on having for a very long time and would anticipate a number of avionic upgrades so conduit is a must.  Right sizing of the conduit is also a must, you don't want to end up with too little, and you really don't want to end up with a mess of conduit to have to work around.

What I ended up doing is running 1/2 CPVC down the wings in the factory drill holes, it's an extremely tight fit, it's light weight and large enough to accommodate all my wiring needs.  I went ahead and put a break in the conduit where the bell cranks go which allows me to run wires from that area down the conduit as well.

1/2" CPVP Conduit, SB-375-4 bushing for AoA and Pitot lines

Something else that needs to be resolved before closing up the wings is your Pitot situation.  I plan to use a heated Pitot/AOA combo meaning I need to install a mounting bracket for that.  I went with the Gretz Aero kit because it's compatible with multiple vendors so if I decided to stray away from Garmin I'll be able to use a Dynon or some other vendor.  The instructions seems a bit confusing but if you look at the pictures you get an idea of what you need to do and it only took about two hours to go through and get it all mounted.  That includes making the bracket, etching and priming.

The Pitot/AOA combo also requires running two separate air lines.  I decided to use the standard run already drilled on the kit and then make an additional hole to run the second line.  Now I would be lying if I said this was easy because the inboard holes on rib three and four which is covered with a skin was a tad challenging.  I ended up using an additional drill head and connected that within the cavity I was drilling... okay that probably doesn't make sense, a better method would be to get a foot long 3/8 inch drill bit.

The final step before I could close the skins was to mount the autopilot roll servo bracket and the Aileron trim. Will have to connect them all later but for the time being all done.

Bottom Skin

This section is all old hat to me.  Although very time intensive, it's not overly challenging from a process perspective but requires quite a bit of ninja skills if you're going to solo rivet.  The gap fairings went on well with the only hangup getting the last four rivets on the flap fairing.  I had help but it was to no avail with trying to get a bar at the very top... In the end I used pop rivets for the four rivets.  Standard builders would have no issues since the inboard bottom skin wouldn't have been attached yet.

Those are the four pop rivets

My cousin who flies C17's down in Altus was up and helped me get started on the actual skins and jstiffners.  We rocked through all the match drilling in about 3 hours.  I saved him from the agony of the deburring and dimpling, he would like to build a plane at some point and those two processes might have quickly changed his mind.

Here's the Gretz Pitot mast after match cutting a hole in the skin.

It was a tad confusing on the actual riveting process.  After reading the plans a good 10 times and looking for pictures online I figure out that you started in the middle, worked your way to the sides at the top and then down... ignoring the three outboard bays.  That's because to get to those you roll the skin back and hit those when you can.  I would suggest having help, but then again I was able to do it solo with only a few minor cuts and bruises.  I'm very happy with how my rivets turned out, only about two dings per side.

All buttoned up

Kit Progress, Stall Warning & Tailcone Attach

Kit Progress

Taking a non-linear approach on continuing the build I worked on the wings and fuselage concurrently.  Also given the list created from the kit inspections I jumped around quite a bit resolving loose ends on steps that either weren't done or left up to the builder to complete.  It's a bit overwhelming having so many things to work on so I just started at the top of my list with the wings and worked through the items until getting to Section 19, likewise I started on the fuselage list and worked through to Section 25.  On items I wasn't ready to complete, I just made a note and moved on, a good example is pro-sealing the fuel senders on the tank, I'm going to wait for my Stainless Steel Heater Bypass Valve so I don't have to make multiple batches of the stuff.

During the progress if I had questions I would email Vans technical support and move on, when they would reply I would jump back to the step.  One such question is how do you remove the forward floor pans with the gear weldments.  Originally Vans had emailed me that they could be removed and should be removed to inspect underneath.  So I sent a picture showing how the weldment stops removal of the pan, they revised their previous statement and said to try and clean under it and move forward.  So that's what I did, painstakingly hand-setting a few hundred cherry rivets.  I'm going to borrow a pneumatic cherry rivet gun for the remaining floor pans when the time comes.

Forward Floor Pans

Something I previously didn't mention is I made some roller assemblies for the fuselage using some of the crate material, left over carpet and wheels.  The fuselage gets shipped bolted into the crate, once you unscrew the outside holders you're left with large wood inserts into the spars. I just made a box to attached it to the existing holders and put some wheels on them.  This screwed into the existing spar piece allows it to be moved around fairly easily.  I then made two platforms, one for the front and one for the back which will keep the piece from rocking back and forth.

Fuselage Wheel

Attached to Fuselage

Tapped Wings

Stall Warning System

Section 19

 I plan on installing an angle of attack system on the plane so in theory I could forgo this section if you want.  But you have all the parts and I'm not comfortable giving up on the basic stall warning system yet.  Plus you get all the parts anyways so why not give it a go and install it!

Nothing is more nerve racking than cutting into your wing skin!  Even with a template and some solid instructions I felt a bit ill as I dremeled my way into the side.  The end result I wasn't happy with so used some of my previously made sanding tools to square it up a bit.  Still not CNC quality but it's covered with a plate and on the bottom of the wing so I'll live.

Made another paint booth!  Not really, I'm just using my crate graveyard as a paint booth for now.  As much as I like AKZO since I don't want to spend 30 mins prepping and 30 mins cleaning for every little part I'm still going to use self etching on the remaining parts.  If they're going to be somewhat visible I'll top coat, otherwise will leave them just primed.

Access plate completed

Reminded me of Legos

The rest of section 19 involves wiring up the alarm which will wait until I wire the plane, so for now this section is complete.

The stall tab is hanging out on the bottom left.

Tailcone Attachment

Section 20

This step is pretty exciting because you finally get to turn your empennage and fuselage kit into a single assembly. I didn't take any pictures of the progress but it's fairly straight forward and consists of cleco'ing together, match/final drilling... then separating and deburring and finally dimpling.

One note on the quickbuild is my mid-fuse top longerons didn't have the 4 #30 holes in the end to match drill into the tailcone longerons.  They did send me the template used previously in the plans but I had to cut off the applicable 4 hole section and line it up with the already installed longerons and make the hole.  Given my history of messing up a longeron I'm ultra sensitive to drilling these things so was a bit nervous doing this step.  The end result of consistent with the plans and was happy to move on.

After all the prep work you get to then reattach the tailcone and mid-fuse and secure with rivets.  This is defiantly a two person job because there are a large number of rivets on the bottom which will need to be set.  You may be able to back rivet, but it's not perfectly flat so you might run into issues with that.  In the end you now have a new improved fuselage....

The RV-10 Quickbuild Details and Inspection

Interdependencies

I can only speak to my experience but when I started building I was a bit overwhelmed with everything. I chose to remain hyper focused on the task at hand, aiming to build the empennage with above average workmanship.  I would say I successfully met that goal and with the months leading to my QB kit deliveries was able to spend a considerable amount of time researching and understanding what the rest of the build will entail.

Vans provides a handy flowchart which breaks down the plans for each kit needed to complete the majority of the aircraft, showing how the kits tie in with each other.  The choices you have in terms of interior, avionics, engine, prop, ect... aren't outlined in the flowchart but as you're going through this you will have an idea of what you want and when to install them.  The plans don't have to be completed in sequential order but there are true dependencies as well as steps you can do concurrently with others. For example on the empennage you can in theory build all the control surfaces at once, only needing them completed for Step 11 - Emp Attachment.

Now unless you're running a team of builders or have done this before I would advice against started several sections at once, from experience working on multiple sections gets a bit overwhelming. Other steps you can partially do and still call it 'complete', but you really mean 'complete for now' such as the empennage because there are a few steps you won't finish until near the end with final riveting of the top skins, or the attachment of the fairing trim. Just make a note of it and deal with it when you need to.

RV-10 Flowchart

In reference to my build this chart shows which sections are completed for you with a quickbuild. The short story is the QB Wings and Fuselage have a majority of the structural pieces complete but there are still plenty of steps you will be responsible for and you'll have to inspect for both quality and completeness. 

Kit Inspections

I think of the QB kits similarly to if I was buying someone's already started project... hope they did a great job but need to verify it for completeness and quality.  The most logical method for me was to start on Step 13 of the wings and walk through each section and each step and make notes of things not completed or of questionable quality.  There were some steps that required two people to maneuver the pieces (Removing the tanks) but I went through each step and made a laundry list of items I needed to give attention to later. Here's what I found:

Wings

·         13-3 step 9 - Enlarge hole and Bushing (If needed)

·         13-4 step 6 - Tap tiedowns, 3/8x16

·         13-5 step 1 - 1/4 inch hole on brackets

·         15-4 step 4 - Drill out extra rivet

·         16-2 step 3 - Match drill #19 & #8

·         16-3 step 2 - Install Nutplates

·         17-3 step 12 - Fill stall slot holes (Maybe)

·         17-3 step 12 - Pitot tube rivet removed, unless AoA covers

·         18- 5 step 5 – Attach VA-146 Bearing

·         18-7 steps 1-3 – Fuel Sender installation

·         18-8 step 6 – Reattach Tanks to wing leading edge

·         21-10 step 1-2 - Aileron Attach

·         22-5 step 3 - Install attach hardware

·         22-8 step 13-14 - install flap

 Quick Build Fuselage

·         27-2 step 3 – Enlarge Lycoming Engine holes to 5/8

·         27-6 step 3 –Install two snap bushings for rudder pedals

·         27-6 steps 5-6 – Cabin heat install

·         28-10 step 12 – Nutplates and Rivets for FloScan or FT install

·         28-12 step 2 – Rivet Firewall assembly to Floorskins

·         29-5 step 4 – F-1006B cleco skins

·         29-8 step 13 – Baggage door Shims

·         29-16 step 3 – Remove Baggage door, hatched area

·         29-16 step 4 – Enlarge wing wire runs and install bushings both sides

·         29-16 step 9 – Rivet baggage door shims

·         29-19 step 8 – Vent door hardware install

·         29-20 step 1 – Rivet floor pans

·         30-2 steps 2-3 – Debur and install steps

·         30-3 steps 1-6 – Angle steps

·         30-4 steps 1-2 – mount and bolt steps

In the end if you didn't find any issues then I would recheck it again because you missed something. There are built by hand so even in that setting there's bound to be some missed things, I'm sure Vans could up their quality control system but that would greatly affect the price, so it's still an unbelievable time saver.  It took me a total of 11 hours to inspect everything and as a bonus I'm now fairly familiar with how everything went together.  Sure it won't be as intimate as if you spend 100's of hours shooting rivets, but you know enough about the construction to make you comfortable with the build.

Post Inspection

RV-10 Quickbuild Sections

For continuity I wanted to provide all the section drawings for the inspected assemblies.  Based on my inspection I'll have to revist most these sections before I would call them 'complete'.

Wings

Section 13

Section 14

Section 15

Section 16

Section 17

Section 18

Section 21

Section 22

Fuselage

Section 25

Section 26

Section 27

Section 28

Section 29

Section 30

Section 31

Quickbuild Kit Delivery

Delivery

It's been 5 months and about a week since I ordered my Quickbuilds kits and today they arrived via ABF.  Vans had called me 3 weeks ago and gave me some shipping options. I gave Tony Partain a call but he was booked for the next month and a half so went with the crate and freight method.  Took Vans a bit to get them crated, I think they had some people out for the holiday so it didn't get shipped out till the end of the month and took about a week to get to me.

The three crates combined came in at around 1,600 lbs, with the largest of being 1,300 lbs by itself.  After visually inspecting each crate for any damage they were unloaded and moved into the airplane factory.

ABF got them right next to my garage.  I was a bit impatient took a peak....

Inventory

As with the empennage I'm not tracking my inventory and unpacking time and organization time.  It was completed in less than 4 hours but my neighbor Jason was helping me pop open crates and move parts, while my wife was marking off items on the inventory pick sheets.  Here are some pictures of the unboxing.

Once everything was unpacked and accounted for I tried to determine the best way to organize everything.  There were a lot more parts than I had anticipated, a lot of hardware and plenty of tubing and metal pieces.  I had to spill over into the 3rd car slot but once I can get going on the project I hope to consolidate it a bit.

Ready to get started!