SonexBuilders.net

Ok, so I have been building airplanes for quite a few years (decades) – but I can still pull a dumb move now and again. I can’t be the first one to build one of these backwards, can I? It's been a long time since my first quarter of college when I took drafting, but still - I should remember the difference between a solid and a dashed line! :oops:



The worst part is how far along I got before discovering that SOLID line along the top that told me that the flange should be coming UP at me – not pointed down at the workbench….. Oh well, live and learn – you can’t just take the templates, cut them out, and paste them on the outside of the aluminum angel without a great deal of scrutinization of the plans page relating to the part to see if it makes sense. After this little screw-up, I checked several of the other templates, and a couple of them had to be reversed in order to glue them on the outside of the angle. Putting templates in the inside of aviation angel is problematic because of the fillets.
We’ve now made all of the pieces on the template page, and have learned a few good things along the way:

1) Low-tack spray adhesive was our final choice to attach the templates to the material. High-tack is too hard to get off later!
2) A brand new band saw blade is one of life’s little luxuries, and makes clean-up of the final edges so much easier.
3) All of those little W29 wing angles….we used our little 18” table-top, clamp-on brake to bend them – worked well. We also cut strips of the raw material the finished width of the little brackets, then pasted the templates on, drilled all the holes, then cut them in to individual pieces. Much easier to handle that way.
4) We keep the inventory sheets handy – they make finding the needed parts for the next drawing much easier, and also it helps when fabricating new parts from raw stock – makes it easy to know where the part should come from.
5) In our two-person shop, we are using the drawings as our build log – initialing and dating each part on the drawing when it is complete. A yellow highlighter is also used to show what has been done. That way, we can work independently and still keep track of where we are.

Oh….here is that part built the right way! (It’s really nice that Sonex gives you enough raw material to screw a few things up and not have to re-order because you ran out of stock….).


On to building stuff!

Paul

Cool. I would have just converted to a right side opening canopy!

Save that part!!! It is the right side latch for a swing back canopy. With a swing back you can tell everyone this was intentional. :-)

I can't tell you how many times I've been there Paul. I guess that's the "education" part of the recreation and education reason of why we build! As you said, it's nice that you get some extra materials so you can laugh for a second and then move on.

As Bill said, you may want to consider saving some of the "messed up" parts just in case you can re-use them later on something else. I ended up using a lot of my mistake-parts in other places throughout the build.

In the meantime, build on and have fun! At some point, if you get a few moments I'd love to hear your thoughts on the Sonex kit and plans, given your experience of building a lot of other designs.

Thanks!

You're not the first:

Very first part I made on my Sonex project:
http://www.mykitlog.com/users/display_l ... 47&row=296

(2nd of December 2009, I can't believe its been that long!)

Paul, I had the same issue multiple times while cutting angle parts. And I ran into several instances where the view layout and/or dimensioning scheme Sonex used for some of those parts was completely backwards (not wrong, just different) from the way I would have generated that view in the drawings I used to do at work. I'd cut the part thinking I had the overall length right, then find out that there were other parts I hadn't noticed in other views. I noticed on some of the "reformed angle" parts that get opened/closed that the other flange sometimes wasn't shown in one of the views, adding to my confusion. It did often seem like whatever way they did the dimensions was opposite from the way I'd want them for marking and cutting it. Again, not wrong, just a difference in the way my brain must operate.

There were a few where I had to go generate the part in my own CAD system and redrop the layout and dimensions my way to get the part right. But once you've seen it a few times you'll know what to look for.

Just had a flashback - my buddy was building a Thatcher CX4 and came over to bend his ailerons on my 8' Tennsmith brake. He bent two left ailerons. There was much cursing and gnashing of teeth.

Sonex seems to locate views so as to get the most possible on a sheet of paper rather than use conventional drafting standards. You really have to watch of where section views are taken.

David A.