The two curved channels and two straps that connect them arrive pre-punched to #40 and must be drilled to #30. The four parts must be clecoed together with
the silver clecos, severely straining my supply. The Isham tool kit which I bought at the start of this project had up to this point had the right amount of everything, and I initially feared the kit was actually lacking in this regard. Not so. Doing half of the structure at a time worked fine. I clecoed every other hole, inside and out, with silver (#40), drilled the exposed holes #30 and clecoed with copper. This pulled the straps in tight against the curvature. Also shown in the first picture is my one-handed cleco-pickup tool (a board with holes drilled in it). There are many times when you're holding something with one hand but need to insert a cleco with the other.
An air drill is an absolute must for this much drilling. I use the air drill for anything that doesn't require speed control, such as drilling out rivets or counter sinking.
Speaking of which, the entire outer surface, a double row all the way around, must be countersunk. Since the Lexan canopy will lie underneath these flush rivets (or "lay" underneath as stated in the build manual. Perhaps they will be producing eggs since they will be "laying." Van's should be embarrassed by having their grammar corrected by an engineer).
In the jargon of airplane builders a rivet or other item which protrudes slightly above a surface is described as being "proud" of the surface. I love this descriptive terminology. Along those lines I am hereby introducing a new term. A rivet or other item which ends up slightly below a surface will hereafter be described as "ashamed" of the surface. Since the canopy will lie against these rivets, I counter-sank them a bit more than normal, causing them to end up a bit ashamed of the surface and thereby unable to scratch the Lexan.
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