#PERFECT HORIZON STABILIZER HOW TO#
#PERFECT HORIZON STABILIZER SERIES#

Plain nuts nuts in place of locknuts will save you a lot of time and effort. Use temporary hardware when fitting the elevators, since you will have them on and off a lot. If you haven't drilled the holes for the center pivot bolt yet, make sure you don't place it too close to the torque tube (or the flange, which would be just as bad).Ģ.

#PERFECT HORIZON STABILIZER HOW TO#

The plans are silent on the specifics of how to properly install the elevators, so here are some notes based on my experience:ġ. I'm not worried about this fastener substitution, since the specs say you can directly substitute a MS21042 for the equivalent nyloc nut. Still, it was a real fight, requiring all manner of adapters and flex couplings to make it work. The other side was just as bad – I ended up using a MS21042 metal locknut here in place of the specified AN365, because I was able to get a socket on its smaller-diameter head. In retrospect the plans set you up to fail here, because there's no warning about this possibility, and it's very easy to have this happen if you blindly follow the prescribed dimensions for installing the rod end bearings. I ended up making it work with a crow's foot wrench, but it was a close-run thing. I ran into a trap I unknowingly set for myself years ago… the hole I drilled for the center elevator pivot bolt is awfully close to the torque tube, which means getting a wrench on the bolt head is almost impossible. I must have had the elevators on and off the airplane at least fifty times adjusting various things, but the result is a set of elevators that moves with very little drag. Properly installing the elevator pivot bolts and spacer washers is a real exercise in frustration, and you have to take your time and take great pains to get everything exactly aligned or else you'll wind up with unwanted control friction. Believe it or not, it took a solid day of work to get to this point from the last photo. Here's the left elevator installed with the correct bolts and everything torqued:Īnd here's the right elevator installed too. I added some nylon grommet edge material to the lightening hole too, which is probably not necessary but makes me feel better. Now I've tie-wrapped them to the left-side root rib of the horizontal stabilizer, and run them back to the elevator through the previously-drilled bushing hole.

Since I never previously had room to leave the elevators attached permanently, I hadn't yet finished routing the wires to the left elevator for the trim tab motor and position sensor. Here's photo proof that I remembered to reinstall the F-798 shims under the leading edge of the horizontal stabilizer:Īnd, the single washer/spacer between the vertical stabilizer spar and the elevator stop on the left side only: Getting access to all these fasteners to install and torque them properly is a real wrist-shredding exercise. Then I removed the jury-rigged arrangement of wood blocks and clamps that had been holding the vertical stabilizer in place, installed the horizontal stabilizer again, and torqued all the HS and VS mounting bolts.

Before trying to work on anything I dragged it outside and gave it a sponge bath:

#PERFECT HORIZON STABILIZER SERIES#

Finally, some work on the airplane! First of all, after being hauled halfway across the country and then sitting in a series of dusty locations for over four years, the fuselage was absolutely filthy.

Perfect horizon stabilizer