§31-20, -21, -23 Left
I was able to get not only an afternoon to work on the plane, but also get the help of my friend Edwin. Yesterday we attached the nose skins to the skeleton. We completed the vast majority of the work of page 22 as well, but couldn't mark the page as finished since it needs the pitot tube mount that is en route from Van's. That'll be 10 min to do, so expect to see that page marked off on the next post.
The leading edge skins have a much larger radius of curvature than the nose ribs themselves. The instructions have a very bad pun describing the situation: "the skins are in-tension-ally open". Groan. We followed the recommended sequence of attaching the clecos until the skins were tangent enough that I could continue on my own. Despite buying a lot of clecos this summer I'm about 150 shy of the recommended practice of 100 % cleco coverage! I do have 100 % coverage on the curved parts of the ribs that are under tension. I have 33 % coverage on the top spar where the skin is nice & flush so I think that will be just fine.
I'm really happy that I've reached this stage. It's looking like a wing! I anticipate getting a few hours of work done on Sunday. Stay tuned.
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