The aft fuselage is a box made out of verticals and cross ties fixed to longerons of angle material. Here are the parts acid cleaned ready for primer.
The side panels are made as an assembly. It was difficult to fit the verticals and drill from the reverse side but clamping to the bench worked out.
There is no jig so I measured from the plans and squared it up on blocks of wood. I fitted the vertical and horizontal tail to make sure they would end up square.
The tailpost assembly has several angle brackets in tight quarters which need to be drilled from the inside. I made up a template to hold it in place and open up the area for drilling.
The aft fuselage is joined to the forward longerons by attach plates. These are made from 3/16″ material and getting the angles, bends and bevels exactly right requires some precise metalwork.
The bottom skin completes the initial structure of the aft fuselage. Note the tailwheel mount which takes a titanium rod as the spring. Next comes the turtledeck, then the forward fuselage. I hope to have it on the wheels some time next year. The next page in Lynn Jarvis’s Sonex project features more on the fuselage.
Lynn Jarvis’s Sonex project
| 1. Introduction | 2. Sonex specifications | 3. Building the Sonex |
| 4. The tail and spar | 5. The wing | 6. The aft fuselage | 7. More on the fuselage |
| 8. It all comes together | 9. The canopy | 10. The engine | 11. Electrical | 12. The cowling |
| 13. Paint and polish | 14. Moving | 15. Finishing | 16. First flight | 17. Natfly 2004 |