Section 17
Hours: 2

I finished the last couple rows of rivets on the nose and riveted in the light bracket and j-stiffener. In the last 3 days I set 734 rivets! That's about 245 per day or approximately 1 rivet every 2 minutes. You would think you could do better, but clecoing and setup for each rivet slows the process down (not to mention drilling out the occasional bungled rivet).

The finished parts pile in the living room is getting bigger and the parts bin in the garage is shrinking. The whole process is turning small aluminum pieces into larger assemblies and hope an airplane appears somewhere down the line...

Section: 18
Hours: 4

After lunch I started work on preparing the ribs for the fuel tanks.

Stacks of ribs waiting to be prepped.

Woody making sure those flanges are really 90° to the table.

Stacks of ribs fluted and final drilled.