Small task today. There is a service bulletin RV-7 on the vans support website for the passengers steering stick described in SB 07-2-6 .
The reason for this is that some incidents were reported where pilots reported hard landing incident after the passenger inadvertently pulled out the stick from the stick receptacle on the control column during a landing flare.
To solve it, you have to secure the removable stick in the receptacle. Some builders use a spring pin mechanism but as I am probably never going to remove the stick from the passenger side, I decided to go with the fixed bolt solution as described in the service bulletin.
First I located the position of the hole according to the plan.
during drilling, you have the stick inserted in the receptacle so that it's nicely match drilled. No way to do this seperatly because you can never be sure to be able to drill dead center on the column.
First drilled small pilot hole, enlarged to #13 and finally used the #12 reamer for an AN3-13A bolt.
first very nicely indeed.
After deburring the hole
This is the first time on the plane that I'm experimenting with a cotter pin and castle nut.
This is the correct and preferred way to install a cotter pin.
First torque the AN310 castle nut like a regular nylon nut. Then you align the hole in the cavity of the castle nut.
Insert the cotterpin and lightly tap it with ar rubber mallet from the back or pull it with pliers from the front so it's all the way in.
No you can use a small and narrow flat screwdriver to open the pins.
You will probably have to cutoff some length if each leg.
On the bottom side the cutoff is very small. The right amount is bending down not further than the washer to avoid scratching on the underlying material.
Bend over the other leg with pliers and estimate a length to cover 3/4 of the diameter of the bold.
Use a hammer to lightly tap the leg down so that you get a nice crisp bend.
Installing this cotter pin now is a bad idea actually as you can't install the control column with the sticks already bolted so I had to take this apart again. But it was a good exercise to do on the workbench and get a feel for it.
Another little tip on installing the control column : you have to install plenty of washers (sometimes more than one) between the rod end bearings and the mount. This can be a very stressfull unless you use a simple trick.
I used some painters tape and folded it in half leaving a small section exposing the glue. now you can easily stick a washer to the exposed glue part and slide it gently in between the opening. Once is between the opening, you
can use a small flat screwdriver or punch to position the washer in place. Very easy... no extra tool, no stress.
