It's time to get started on the wings! First up is spar prep. These spars are really beautiful. Given the size of the rivets in them, I'm very glad assembly of the spar itself is not something I have to do!
The manual has plans for creating a wing stand for the spar to sit on while the wing is assembled. I will clear space to build that relatively soon, but on the advice of another builder, I'm going to keep things on the bench until I just can't do anything else without putting them in the larger stand. I built some U shaped padded blocks to hold the spar solid on the workbench for now.
I looked at the plans over and over to make sure I was starting correctly, then bit the bullet and started reaming holes. The first task is to install nutplates on the upper and lower inner spar flanges for the fuel tank skins to screw to. So I started by reaming the pre-punched holes to #40, then countersinking, dabbing with some primer on a Q-tip, and riveted nutplates on with the squeezer. I only got a half dozen done tonight, but at least I have things set up for my next session now, so the rest should go relatively quickly. There are 62 of these nutplates per spar. I think I'll probably go ahead and prep both spars even if I only end up building one wing at a time. There is so much time spent in getting things set up correctly that I think I'll save a bit of time by completing the same task on both spars at once.
