Tail Cone Finished

It took just about an hour to finish the tail cone this morning. As I had already set almost all the rivets to be riveted I could start right away doing what I like most - riveting that is.
I'm almost feeling a bit sorry and empty right now after finishing this milestone. Or is it just the fatigue from raising my arm holding the riveter so high and so often in the last few days ...
To get to this point I spent 67.0 hrs on the tail cone, which adds up to 183.5 hrs invested so far.



The manual riveter for tight places came in quite handy when riveting on the half rib that supports the nose cone of the vertical stab.



and another look into the abyss - this time it looks much more realistic as the top skin is on now.



And one last peculiarity that the plans are not really explicit about. I was worrying when I read the steps and I did not look this up in other blogs ahead of time and finally decided to go ahead and make an educated guess and I just confirmed with Dave's blog that my guess was right.
Please look at the three rivet lines and follow them to the edge of the structure.



The middle one that attaches the J-stiffener to the top skin is indeed riveted all the way to the edge and this is the exception to the no-rivets-seven-inches-from-the-edge rule that applies to all other holes of the tail cone. If you follow the plancs step by step you kind of think that this is what you're supposed to do but they don't explicitly tell you that really mean it.
So, to ease your mind... YES, go ahead and rivet the J-stiffener all the way to the top skin!
And if you didn't - not a problem either, you can always ADD a rivet. Removing one is the part that isn't so enjoyable.

Alright, I'm done with the first kit!
I am not going to attach the control surfaces to the tail cone just yet - at least not permanently as it will be much easier to store the cone with those attached and I still can't afford a hangar around here. I think I'll just find a place on the covered patio in the area where the wings will be stored once finished.

I'll add some silica gel inside the cone and cover it up with paper just like I did with the Stabilator which should allow it to sit there for a while just fine.

Now what am I gonna do???? The wing kit is about 4 weeks out and not much else to do on the cone. Maybe I do attach the empennage and install the trim servo and all the other little things so I wouldn't have to do this later. I can take the surfaces off again and put everything into storage then.
Hm ....