Rear Bulkhead Cut

The morning started by catching up on the left over from yesterday, riveting the stabilizer tip on.

And then the two pieces got stored away again until the rigging of the control cables.
The next step on the list was to modify the rear bulkhead to allow the tank to be permanently installed. I removed my old markings and applied new ones. The previous ones didn't take the existing screws into account and so the screws didn't line up with the existing ones. After this rather time consuming ordeal I was able to clamp the two back pieces together and see if they had roughly the right size.

As this turned out to be the case, I drilled, deburred, dimpled and riveted the two pieces together.

I clamped the back angle to the bulkhead and ensured that it properly aligned.

Here you can see the drill markings on the front. I used a punch to mark the position for the drill bit.

On to the drill table... Clecoed as I drilled. All the holes are #30s at this point.

All the holes line up perfectly in the back support angle. I must have done something right when calculating the positions of the markings.

I opened up the holes for the screws with a #19 drill bit and unclecoed the parts and deburred all the holes. Then I went on to cut the bulkhead. That's when I noticed that I had no clue if I could actually do it on the bandsaw.
Well, I couldn't! One cut could have been done but only on the wrong side which would have not allowed me to support piece properly during sawing. And this could have caused issues when trying to follow the line or even bent the metal. I decided to go manual on this rather delicate cut.

Why is there a saw blade in the previous picture, you might ask. Well, the hacksaw (sounds gross but the blade is a very fine one, so it's more a surgical tool than a real hacksaw) would only go so far - about 2 and half inches that is. The rest I cut by using a saw blade and my bare fingers to pull it through. I now officially understand the saying that not money nor time are the factors in finishing a homebuilt plane, it's will power.

Almost through. Look closely, the blade is at the last corrugation. At that point I was getting worried that the mechanical forces on the bulkhead that occurred from the violent pulling on the saw blade could bend the cutout just before breaking through. I decided to ply it safe and clamped the pieces together as well as the bulkhead to the work bench.

That made all the difference. With the forces tamed I could focus on finishing a straight cut to the end and the pieces came apart cleanly. I rounded the sharp inner edge in the larger part of the bulkhead and deburred all the edges. I was now able to cleco the back support on and see how much I had to remove from the shorter angle to clear the bulkhead frame. I shortened the piece, deburred the edges again and clecoed it back on to take on last shot.

I decided to dimple the screw holes and use K1100-08 nutplates plus one fancy one with one lug that will go into the corner. The order went out today but until later next week I don't expect to see any parts. I might have some K1100 left but I'm not sure if there are enough to finish the job.
Also I will have to work on the floor plate which I couldn't do today.