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Pretty excited to start building would be quite an understatement. I've been wanting to build an RV-8 since I was in high school and now that I am shifting from the wanting stage to the doing stage, it feels a little surreal and I feel unqualified... Anyway, step one: breaking the edges of the rear horizontal stabilizer (HS) spar stiffener. This serves two purposes: to get rid of the sharp edges and corners which can lead to stress fractures in the parts and to allow the stiffeners to sit flush to the spar (so the edge of the stiffener follows the curved corner from the web to the flange of the spar). Here is a before and after of the spar stiffeners:  I don't quite have the optimal setup here in the apartment. A bench grinder would be amazing at doing stuff like this but I feel like that would throw aluminum dust everywhere so in this airplane factory it's done with a hand file... Can you say "takes forever"? I can. Doing this by hand takes forever, but it can be done. After the edges are sufficiently broken and smooth, cleco the stiffeners to the HS rear spar and match drill the holes to final size.  That's all she wrote for tonight as my hands and arms hurt and are worn out from all that filing. Mental note: get a bench grinder.
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