Wingtip Rib, revised (Mar. 27th/28th 2005)

After weeks of few activities the tip rip is temporarily fastened now.

Fitting all this fourty gussets was a real pain. The fit is not 100%, small gaps here and there, however with the project progressing along I reduce my ambitions (or better adjust them to my abilities).

The white blob is my first design of the wingtip strobe cover. Currently I have not a faint idea how to make them. Plexi forming? or casting? bending Lexan? or using torch and real glass? or anything else?

sidenote:

The German aviation authorities require anticolission lighting. What I dont' like at all are some kind of glass cylinders sticking out into the airstream. Therefore a 'blinking pot' on the fuselage or ontop of the vertical fin is no option for me. What is left are either wingtip strobes or a partially transparent vertical fin tip.

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Wingtip Rib (Mar. 5th/6th 2005)

I already put a lot of work into this wingtip (about 15 h and it's only one of two). What I didn't like at the Sonex design is that you cannot prevent the distortions caused by the flange flutings. Some of these look so-so, some worse. I like a clean end of the wing. So I made the rib as a flat sheet without any flanging.

This is the edge between the wingskin (light part) and the wingtip rib (dark part). The pic doesn't show the edge clearly. I sanded angles on each of the two sheets such that that there is no visible gap or step.The bright line is the sanded end of the wingtip rib.

Instead of the fluted rib flange I use these individual tabs made from 0.032" sheet. The tabs will be riveted to the wingskin with two 3/32 flush pulled rivets each. I used the smaller rivets because this many 1/8" rivets may disturb the curvature (and, besides would be total overkill). Because of the curvature each tab has a slightly different angle, therefore this work occupied me the whole Sunday.

I intend to install a homebrewn strobelight into each wingtip (I can't understand why commercial suppliers like Aeroflash or Wheelen route cables from one wing end to the other carrying seversl thousand Volts. This -will- disturb any HF equipment). Because of the electronics in my wingtips, the tip ribs have to be removable for servicing. Each tab carries a MS21049-L08K countersunk nutplate. The tip is attached with 40 (!) MS24693-S48 screws (I would better had 6/32 screws, but this is what Wicks offers in his online catalog).

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