While dealing with other high priority matters, I kept trying to figure out a workable solution to this dilemma. I knew the flaperons could be made by the builders the old time consuming, inefficient and less than perfect way, but I just couldn’t accept that as being good enough. Finally, one of our builders, Scott Gettings, volunteered to make a pre-molded flaperon section about 3 feet long out of carbon fiber. He sent me the results and I was very impressed. That was just before Sun & Fun. By the time I got past the Sun & Fun thing and got back home, I had made up my mind. I just felt like the true solution to the assembly of the flaperons was to pre-mold them.

Making the decision to make those molds was not easy believe me. Making a mold 3 feet long was one thing, but I had already made a lot of molds and I just knew it was going to be a huge challenge to make molds 8 feet long that were perfectly straight in the shape of our flaperons. I was not wrong. It was a huge job that took countless hours, but l was determined that these molds were going to be the Final Solution as Regis might say. First I made templates just like hot wire templates out of 3/16 steel for each end of the flaperon cross section. Then I made heavy steel mounts to bolt the templates to the work table. Then I made a very heavy, perfectly flat table with a one inch MDF top on which I adhered a block of 3 thick, by 16 wide, by 9’ 2 long piece of blue styro-foam. Then I got a 5 X 2 X1/4 aluminum i-beam to use as a sanding bar and I started sanding.

I then built substantial 1 ½ angle iron stands for each of the molds. We glassed the molds to the stands and proceeded to buff out the surfaces and treat the surfaces with mold release and pull the first proof parts. I was not disappointed. They are beautiful, light weight and extremely strong and stiff. Once assembled all the builder will have to do is fill pin holes and paint. The end result is going to be flaperons that are all the same thickness, are perfectly straight, have a very straight trailing edge that will STAY straight, that fit the wing, and are balanced and easy to finish. When other knowledgeable composite builders walk up to a plane with these flaperons on it, they are going to look down the trailing edges and they will marvel at the accuracy and trueness. These flaperons are going to have other benefits. The hinge points will be installed in these flaperons before the hinge is attached to the wing. The hinges will then be attached to the flaperon with the hinge pin and the flaperon will be located on the back of the wing. The hinge will be trimmed to fit the back of the wing and attached with the flaperon in exactly the proper relationship to the wing. This process will be much simpler and faster and much, much more accurate