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QB fuselage: individual wing weights

juanames

I'm New Here
Dear RV8 builders,

This is one of my first few posts on VAF forums. I want to thank everyone in advance for any support. You are an incredible community!

I am planning to build a QB RV-8 at my 4th floor terraced apartment near Zurich, Switzerland. :rolleyes:

The goal is to build a light RV-8, with VFR glass panel, IO360M1B with a composite CS prop. Thinking about Ken Kruger’s landing gear mods.

I’ll be conditioning a terrace to serve as a small workshop. Will be very much space limited, but I intend to sequence the building process the best I can to manage it. Total shop area will be 8.2ft by 19.5ft :eek:

As I’ll have to crane the fuselage and wings up, I would really appreciate if you could indicate what’s the approximate individual weight of each wing and the fuselage when they arrive in QB form. Also, it possible, would appreciate as well to know the approximate weight of the finished fuselage, without canopy, engine, tail surfaces and landing gear. Approximate figures will help.

Any other suggestions or opinions would be appreciated!

Thanks a lot for any feedbacks!:)

Happy flying!

Juan
 
Weight of Wings

Hi Juan -

The wings on the 8 don't weigh much - maybe like 80 or 100 pounds each. A crane could easily lift them. Likewise the fuselage can easily be carried around by two people. It's the other parts which go into the fuselage which add a lot of weight - like the gear.

I think the initial issue might be the fact that they are sort of unwieldy and that it might be a little difficult to derig them from the harness at your terrace without dropping them. I wouldn't do it.

No offense, but it is sort of crazy to work in such a small area. If you do it, you will find that there are important parts of the build which cannot be done - one of the big ones would be setting the angle of incidence/sweep of the wings. Also, unless you own your apartment building, your neighbors might not like all the noise you're going to generate. Even if you do own it, they won't like it.

I read about a guy who is well known on this forum who built a -6 in his Brooklyn, NY apartment. His name is Vlad. In many ways he is an exceptional person. But, I think he probably had much more than 10x18.

I would recommend a secure, well lit area, at least 40x40.

I have been building mine at a school (the empennage) and at my buddy's machine shop.

I would talk to the other builders in Swiss. There are several I read about. One of them named M. Coggins I think just finished an -8. He can tell you what it's like to build one. Maybe you also reach out to Vlad. If you search the forums, you will quickly find him. But, like I said, from what I read about him, he is an exceptional person.

Try to figure another way. You will be glad you did.

Good luck and godspeed.
 
Dear Drum,

Thanks a lot for your response. Lots of great info and advice!

Your inputs come at the right time!

At the moment I am receiving good support from EAS (Swiss EAA), and they are suggesting I visit the workshops of a few builders in order to evaluate noise and space aspects.

I agree with you that with such a small workshop there is no sufficient space to install the wings, not even the tail surfaces, engine and prop. This is why my idea, in order to make good progress, is to initially build the tail, store it, then each wing, then store them, then the fuselage, and prior to tail surface, landing gear and engine installation, move everything to a properly sized and ground level shop for final mounting, rigging and painting.

Of course, I do have more space at the terrace, but only to be used in good weather, where I could install a painting cabin, and also setup some well protected temporary storage.

This is all at the very beginning of the planning, and I’ll of course be considering all options. This is why all opinions/suggestions from you experts, are much appreciated and welcomed!

If I would crane the fuselage and wings up, would you recommend to lift them up together with their wooden crates to mitigate any potential deformation of the structures?

Thanks again!

Juan
 
I built my RV-8 in a 1-car garage of roughly 10 x 20. It had a workbench and shelves along one wall. That worked pretty well, although I was not able to have the rudder and the engine installed at the same time.

Also, to be fair, I had an adjoining shop with tools that was in additional space. So if, in addition to your balcony space for the airplane, you don't mind having a drill press, disc sander, compressor, and maybe a lathe in your living room, you should be all set.

(To be fair, many build without a lathe. So I am kind of joking. But I did find a number of things that I was able to do better because of the lathe.)

Good luck, enjoy the journey.
 
Thanks a lot Steve!

I’ll consider the Lathe, although I reckon it might take me 2500 hours just to learn how to operate it! :)

My motivation to build exactly were I live, is that this is the only way I can guarantee myself that I will actually progress and eventually complete this project.

Of course, I can compromise a lot when it comes to space. The critical aspect will certainly be noise. If I conclude that noise levels are way too high, I’ll have to consider building somewhere else...

Kind regards,

Juan
 
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