Rudder 3.0

I received the second replacement rudder skin last week (third in total). I was surprised to find it waiting on my front porch since I said several times during phone conversations and and in emails that I would drive to TAF Torrance and transport it down myself. Anyway, I have it and I opened it yesterday.

It was well transported in one of the new cardboard crates TAF is using. The skin was supremely bubble-wrapped and immovable within the crate., I had high hopes it would be in good condition. However, after carefully removing the packaging, my inspection revealed this horror at the top trailing edge:

Unlike the other trailing edge kinks 12-16" down from the end that could easily occur from mishandling the skin, this kink required some assistance to develop. Something crushed it.

Since it was close to the end of the skin, I decided to fix it. I used a combination of composite shims, needle-nose pliers, and a seamer. Here are the results:

It's not perfect and I may work it a little more. But, the story doesn't end there.

I was so distracted by the one kink that I didn't notice a dent on the trailing edge on the other side near the bottom end (marked in red):

It wasn't a big dent, but a dent nonetheless. I worked that one out as best as I could too. It's still perceivable, but less pronounced. I just may go ahead and order another skin.

Aside from the skin drama, I decided to finally assembled the rudder structure. This, of course, resulted in more drama.

Below, you will see the offset in the rivet holes from the spar flange to the rudder control bracket. This is because the rib 1 flange is bent from a point too far out.

This offset impacts alignment in not only the structure but also the skins.

So, I straightened the rib 1 flange and re-bent it. The picture below was my first bend. The second bend lined up much closer.

I used the skin to jig the substructure before riveting to ensure everything was lining up (below):

Then I finally committed to riveting the structure:

Having learned from the elevator, I left the counter-balance off the top rib until the assembly is mated with the skin. The weights put a lot of stress on the naked structure and make it difficult to work with while skinning. I suggest putting the weights on just before adding the tip skins.

I don't have any pictures of the work I did to skin the rudder. I achieved good alignment on the holes using the cleco/loose rivet method on both sides. But, when I inspected the trailing edge, it had a slight curve. I removed the clecos and will attempt again later.