Page 1 of 23

PostPosted: Fri Jun 09, 2006 9:07 am
by uscgairdale
Ever since I got my Lazair II I have been taking a lot of pictures and documenting it's restoration. I've been doing that because (1) I wanted to and (2) because I'll need the documentation when I'll have to deal with the FAA. Regardless, I thought that I would start a thread about my project to share with you. If anyone wants to see something specific, just ask and I'll provide a picture.

The two-seater thread in the Pilots Lounge has a bunch of stuff in it already.
http://lazair.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=55

Dave

PostPosted: Fri Jun 09, 2006 9:13 am
by uscgairdale
I've been focusing mostly on the wing restoration now. Here's a great picture of the right wing D-cell and it's aileron. I rebuilt the aileron ribs and it's ready to be covered......with Tedlar of course.

You can also see just how nicely the wing is cleaning and polishing up. If you are going to do a recover, you definitely need to get one of those small portable steam cleaners to help take off the old tapes.....works real nice. It takes an increadible amount of effort to get the D-cells to shine up like that but man does it look nice!

PostPosted: Fri Jun 09, 2006 9:15 am
by uscgairdale
Only one more rib to build for the right wing.

PostPosted: Fri Jun 09, 2006 9:17 am
by uscgairdale
Here's a before picture of a wheel.

PostPosted: Fri Jun 09, 2006 9:19 am
by uscgairdale
And the after picture. Tyler, here's another angle of the bracket installation for the brakes.

PostPosted: Fri Jun 09, 2006 9:25 am
by uscgairdale
Next weekend I hope to fire these bad boys up.

PostPosted: Fri Jun 09, 2006 1:10 pm
by JPXman
awesome dave!

i looked at your ribs and thought of one thing - when you do assemble the wing, BEFORE you cover, install your capstrips. Get all those holes drilled into the strip itself and the rib. This way, i found when i installed my capstrips after the tedlar was on, tiny bits of aluminum shavings from the drilling process was trapped under the tedlar and inside the foam tape on the rib.... i'm sure a minor detail that nobody will see, but with such effort you could avoid by doing pre-cover. put a mark on the side of the rib near one hole so you can line up the capstrips later when the foam tape is on, and then use the capstrip as a guide to drill the rest, and you'll only be drilling tedlar and foam, not aluminum.

Tyler

PostPosted: Fri Jun 09, 2006 3:22 pm
by uscgairdale
That's good advise. I already have all the holes drilled so any metal shavings shouldn't be an issue.

PostPosted: Sat Jun 10, 2006 8:11 am
by uscgairdale
Here's a pic of the ruddervator control arm mod.

PostPosted: Sat Jun 10, 2006 8:14 am
by uscgairdale
I was working on the aileron bellcrank in the wing yesterday and can across some severe corrosion on one of the plates. The aluminum started delaminating so I made a new one out of 2024 T3.