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Raceair Skylite Build and sub-kit developments

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Joined
Jan 27, 2012
Messages
1,508
Location
Glendale, CA
Hello All,

As some of you know I bought the rights to the Raceiar Skylite and Lil Bitts. This thread will be where I post my progress on working toward Sub-Kit components as well as an eventual build. I will also start a thread in another location for members to post, ask questions and offer up advice.

OK first post then: Rib Jig Sub Kit and Rib Development

The Skylite rib is made from a piece of sheetmetal that is bent into an L shape with a 45 degree bend on the edge to help with allowing the fabric to roll over without sharp edges. The 45 also adds a bit of rigidity. Since I don't have access to a 48" bending brake, I decided to find a sheet metal shop to bend me up some test pieces. The pieces came out much better than expected and I decided to work on a Rib Jig Sub kit that could be purchased by the builder and it comes with a full size plan as well as a bunch of 3D printed pieces to build the jig. I designed a simple spring loaded swing out clamp to hold the pieces in place for assembly and drilling. I also designed a drill assembly to build the vertical rib supports.


The Rib Jig kit will include everything but the board. The board is just a melamine shelf that can be purchased at any Home Depot or Lowes. The plan is attached with 3M 77 and then covered with clear packing tape to protect it. All of the required holes to attach the rib guides, 3D printed Clamps and such are drilled in advance. Also the drill assembly for the Vertical supports can be attached to the Rig Jig as well. In my pics I show it on a vice, but its because I have not built the jig yet. I am still working on the drawing.

When making the Vertical Rib supports, the drill assembly allows the builder to slide the material into the assembly and depending on which is needed decides on which guides to use. Also the outer edge of the guides are used to mark the length as well. The drill is undersized as these will just be pilot holes to set the locations in the main portions of the rib and they will be drilled to size as a match drill on the rib jig.

So far everything worked as planned and as soon as the drawing is done will order and 3D print everything to build one up for testing. I am really trying to incorporate 3D printed parts through this build and development as alignment aids, jigs and sometimes actual parts. I need to get my feet wet printing Glass reinforced nylon to see if I can make my own printed rib widgets. The widgets are the grey pieces in the CAD file that attach the rib to the spar tubes. I am also considering (unsure as of yet) for builders with 3D printers of their own I may release the files to print the jig components as a lower cost option where builders just purchase the Rib Jig Plan and STL Print files and make everything themselves. Its all up in the air right now..

OK enough for now. Feel free to comment on the separate discussion forum.

Best regards,

Marc
 
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