Cleaveland Tool shipment arrives; DRDT-2 shelf constructed

Oh happy day - on July 5th, a large shipment of aircraft tools arrived from Cleaveland Tool (thanks for the excellent packing job, Annette!) and a couple days later, the DRDT-2 arrived. I started with the base RV-14 toolkit, and then substituted (e.g. DRDT-2 for the c-frame tool) and added from there.  The quality of all the tools appears excellent. I decided to go with both  2X (Sioux brand) and 3X (Cleaveland brand) rivet guns, since I like the lighter touch of the Sioux 2X for most -3 and -4 rivets, but need the 3X gun for the bigger boys. The Sioux air drill is a lightweight dream. I also decided to get a pneumatic pop rivet puller and a pneumatic squeezer, both of which should save my hands a bit.  I like manually placing my own clecos - for now - so a pneumatic cleco gun is not (yet) on my radar. The tungsten bucking bar is really quite amazing to hold.  The density of tungsten is about 2.5x that of steel, so this 1.7lb little guy should be able to fit into places that the larger, steel, footed bucking bar (2.2lb) can't reach. I'm looking forward to using it.

As many of you know, the DRDT-2 seems to be the premium dimpling c-frame, and many builders have designed separate workbenches for their use.  I went the route of designing a small shelf that fits nicely between the two workbenches, to which I bolted the DRDT-2.  The height of the shelf is such that the lower dimple die will be at the same level as the two workbenches, and the shelf can slide back about 40% to accommodate different aluminum sheet widths.  Removable clamps secure the two tables together, and the shelf to the tables.  Here is the final product, sans dimple dies:

EAA Workbenches completed!

The plans worked very well, and are found here and here.  Note one error on the PDF plans:  on the first page, cuts in fourteen 2x4s and one 4x8' MDF are shown; however, the MDF cuts should be two of each of the 24x60" and 24x50" pieces.  The plans also state using 1/2" plywood for the shelf, but at Home Depot (at least in my town), 1/2" MDF was cheaper, and looks better, so I went with that.  3/4" MDF would work as well.  Regardless, these are two VERY stable tables, and will be excellent platforms on which to build an airplane.  Kudos to EAA Chapter 1000 for designing such nice workbenches!

Here are the near-final workbenches:

Workshop construction and Empennage kit ordered

Welcome to my Builder's Log for my RV-14A!  I have visited/drooled/lurked on Vans Airforce for several months, and after reading many of your posts, I decided to take the EAA SportAir Vans-specific course in sheetmetal construction, and then pull the trigger on purchasing tools (Cleaveland Tools) and finally the RV-14A Empennage Kit from Vans!  The major aircraft tools arrive tomorrow, and the empennage kit should be here late next week.

For now, I'm setting up my workshop, which will occupy just over 2 bays of our garage.  Since it is hot here in central Florida (!), and my wife still wants to use her side of the garage, I needed to construct an insulated wall between where my wife parks and where I have cordoned off an A/C zone to keep temps reasonable to work (for me, that's around 80F).

Wall construction:   Metal studs/tracks were far easier to manipulate, and can be easily trimmed with aviation snips.  The final wall will be shown in a later post.