What's new
Van's Air Force

Don't miss anything! Register now for full access to the definitive RV support community.

DIMPLING WITHOUT DRILLING OR DEBURRING

Nashpdman

Active Member
See below, this is from the Van's Manual Section 5.5, I assume this also applies to RV-10's with final size holes?

"Van's produces two aircraft kits with the holes punched final size (the RV-12 and RV-14*). No deburring is necessary, simply dimple
the holes and then assemble the parts."
 
You are correct…..except scuff the panels first before you dimple if you are going to prime them. It’s a pain to scuff after.

Keith
 
I don't think that is correct for the 10. It has prepunched, but not "final sizes".

IIRC Scott McDaniel has shown us previously that if they are not sized (drilled/reamed) and deburred before dimpling then the smaller ID can result in radial cracks after dimpling.


EDIT: Vans seems to produce a stream of improvements . . . I'm behind :-(
 
Last edited:
Can people with final size hole parts and that have skipped the first assembly and final-hole drilling/reaming report if they’ve had any final assembly issues, in particular not being able to easily insert rivets? It seems to me that part of the reason for the first assembly is to verify that everything fits together and that all the holes align. My Emp kit has final size holes, but when I assembled the horizontal stabilizer, I noticed there were some holes where a rivet could not easily be inserted even with clecos in every hole. So I ran a #41 reamer through each hole one-at-a-time and that process did make some aluminum chips, not much but not zero. If I skipped that process, then maybe some rivets wouldn’t fit in the final assembly. On the other hand, maybe the hole enlargement caused by the dimpling would be enough to make everything fit easily without the first assembly reaming process.
 
Will,

I had have the kits with final sized holes. I’m at the stage where all I have left to rivet are the bottom wing skins. There have been a few occasions where I have had to run a reamer into a certain hole in a row of holes. So maybe 1 in 50 needs a ream to get the rivet to fit. I built on.

Keith
 
Back
Top