Cruella gets her wings!- 3/12

First, a little window to my world. I didn't get much done on the -3 today, but that's OK because I helped Ben mount the wings on his RV-8, named Cruella, for the first time. It's an airplane we picked up mostly complete back at Christmas time. The builder didn't exactly take his time with it, so Ben has spent the last 6 months doing a lot of rework to make it right. Today's wing-mounting session was hard on everyone but the guys finally got the job done. I served as Chief Gopher for tools, moving wing racks & supports, and literally crawling around the shop watching, spotting and measuring. Here's a shot of the Stooges themselves, from the left- Mark "Possum" Phillips, our coworker and Tech Counselor/RV guru, Ben, my boyfriend, and Mark Stauffer, also our co-worker and EAA chapter prez. These guys are great friends and make quite a team for these Manpower Moments. (or Hours, as today turned out.) 

I finished up organizing the hardware and the tail kit this afternoon and spent a good bit of time studying the plans, instructions and spar change notices. While I wait on bar stock for spar caps (84 feet of it!!) and round up missing sheets of wing & fuselage plans, I've decided to start on the tail. With Ben and I moving to a bigger house in September, we don't need to be setting up and taking down elaborate wing or fuselage jigs til we get over there anyway.  Might as well ease into this project with the easy stuff...

I have a 16 oz can of Red Bull in the fridge with my name on it. Tomorrow will be fun.