Harvesting Clecos for Wings

So have started building the wings. Not much to write about as everything started out well and went as per plans. Of course as I was saying this to myself I did find some "knowledge" was needed, and a few bandages. But I am getting ahead of myself.

Here is the bountiful harvest of clecos.  And a warning. Just go ahead and order a thousand 3/32 clecos; if ordered all at once, there is a break in the price at a thousand, and the shipping is only one time. I am on my fourth cleco order; UPS is making bucks on shipping. Here is my cleco farm, ready for harvest. I am doing both wings at the same time, so this is only one of the two wings, Yes I ran out of clecos; the rest are coming in time for the tanks. Total cleco count will be slightly more than a thousand.

The main skins went on as per plans, no really drama, except I had a few holes in the rear spar where the holes in the rib, spar and skin didn't line up. Next time I need to make sure the rib holes line up with the rear spar during the rib to rear spar riveting. It is kind of tough to do it after the rib to spar rivets are in.

I didn't quite follow the plans when I put the J stringers in. I indeed drilled through my finger, even though the plans say  "be careful don't drill through your finger"

The leading edge ribs are notoriously for being hard to fit into the skin. After reading many blogs of those who came before, I decided to reshape the leading edge ribs.  During my first attempt, when the virgin ribs were inserted into the leading edge skin, the rib flanges were actually warping from straight in order to fit the leading edge radius of the pre bent skin. This is ugly, and causes scratches and bumps on the leading edge of the skin. When compared to the fiberglass tip, I think the pre-bent skins have a  different leading edge shape causing a poor fit.  After reading many blogs of those who came before, I decided to reshape the leading edge ribs. Here is a picture of the virgin rib fitting onto the skin. Notice how the tabs in front of the prepunched hole are holding the skin away.

 Everything fits much better with a small tweak to the flange. I am being careful to make the left and right wings the same, since this portion of the wing contributes to the flying qualities. Here is a picture of the reworked rib installed on the left leading edge. There is still a gap between the rib and the leading edge. I don't think it hurts anything, but I might throw some extra Proseal in there when I do the tanks.

I also had an interference on one of the rib to the spar rivets. This is the rib closest to the tank. Not hard to take care of. I am continuing on and looking forward to the Proseal Challenge.