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TheRV7 - This is my Van's Aircraft RV-7 experimental homebuilt airplane logbook. Hello and welcome to my builders log. My name is Tim Bolton and I live in Charlotte NC. I am building this airplane in my garage. The RV-7 is an all metal, 2 place, aerobatic, 200+ mph airplane with a range of over 700 miles. The kit plane can handle engines from 150-200 hp (horsepower) and can be built as a tail dragger or with tricycle gear. You can also choose to go with a tip up canopy or the slider canopy. I am building mine as a tail dragger with a tip up canopy. The tipup canopy allows for maximum visibility. I intend to use this airplane for travel and air to air photography. The tipup canopy will allow me the best visibility for photographing. My photography site is www.TimBolton.com. Build time for this airplane is anywhere from 1300-2000 hours depending on what the builder wishes to include. The kit comes in stages. First the empennage (tail section), the wings are second, next the fuselage and last is the finish kit.
Vans Aircraft uses CAD and computer controlled production tools to make each part. The RV-7/7A is a matched hole kit. The computerized punch press locates and punches each rivet hole. The builder simple aligns the holes and begins assembly. The assemble goes sort of like this. Align the holes and cleco the parts together. Once everything is aligned you remove one cleco at a time and drill each hole to final size. Next you remove all clecos and debur each hole on both sides of both parts. After deburring, each hole must be dimpled or countersunk so the rivet will sit flush in the skin. After dimpling or countersinking, everything has to be prepped and primed. After priming you cleco each part back together. If everything looks good you can now rivet. Remove one cleco at a time and drive the rivet. Back riveting is the best way and makes for the smoothest skins. If you cant back rivet you must squeeze, buck or drive the rivets depending on there location. All in all its not a hard process, just time consuming. Rome wasn't built in a day and neither will my airplane. Being a perfectionist isn't helping to speed up the process either. But as long as its progressing forward I'll be happy.
Friday January 27th, 2012
Welcome to The RV7.com. I was using this site to document my building process of a Van's RV-7 aircraft like the one pictured above. Kit has been sold. I'm leaving the website online for now. If you have any questions, free to contact me.
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This web site and the information contained within it are for entertainment
purposes only. The opinions expressed on construction techniques are my opinions
only and should not be confused with proper construction techniques. Visit Van's Aircraft for more information.
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