All the metal work on the Horizontal Stabilator is done! Spent the weekend (and a bit) reaching this milestone.

Getting the skins prepped went pretty quickly. Deburring the edges and holes and priming the inside. Do the punched holes need deburring? Well, there’s no match drilling or final size drilling required, but the punch does leave a very tiny rim on the exit side that I like to gently level out. Fortunately they were on the “outside” of the skin and easily asscessible.

Then came riveting the skins to the stabilator skeleton (along with a couple of gussets that required some solid rivets).

I also drilled the piano hinges per the templates and installed them. I goofed on this in an earlier stage and cut one of the hinges too short because I was cutting it together with its mate, both 32.5″ long. However, I didn’t read carefully – each individual hinge piece needs to be that length and needs to include an eye on each end. Easy replacement at ~$18 to get a new hinge.

Approx. 12 hour total.