Carlson Skunk Works

Well, it has been a couple of weeks so I thought I would show a little bit of progress.

The big news is that a hanger has opened up out at the local airport, so Sawdust will be moving to a new home about the first of June. It would be really nice to get a bunch of the little things finished up before the move. To that end the elevator and horizontal stabilizer have been connected via the hinges and things lined up very nicely.

I wanted to be sure that everything will clear properly, so I took the stabilizer/elevator assembly out to the garage and set it on the fuselage. Then I put the vertical fin in place to see how it looks.

Not too bad! However, I will need to do some work to provide a secure mounting both front and back. I need to move the horizontal assembly just a bit farther forward than what I had expected. This will require a bit of engineering. I think I will follow the idea of what Randy has done with his stabilizer mount shown on his web page: http://www.mywoodenairplane.com/Fuselage/20110424.aspx

Everything fit other than the final mounting points and it looks like the clearances are good, too.

Marsha came out to the garage to let me know that supper was ready and was reasonably impressed with things and insisted that I take a few more pictures of how it all looks. So, here are a few additional pictures.

As you can see things are getting pretty tight in the garage and I can’t leave anything assembled overnight. After each work session I have to take everything apart again so the car can come back inside. I am REALLY looking forward to moving things to the airport!