Pro Sealing Trailing Edge

Tonight we had the pleasure of pro sealing the trailing edge of the rudder.. Like everyone says, it really is nasty stuff to work with. We prepared ourselves for this process and had all of our tools laid out. Making sure the clecos are nearby is important and having a second pair of hands definitely helps! We made sure not to rivet the skin to the top and bottom ribs completely as to allow us to have room to work, in other words so the skin would be able to "butterfly" open so we could fit the trailing edge wedge in.

We mixed up the pro seal and it was a lot thicker than I expected. We used a popsicle stick to mix it as well as apply it. Initially we planned on using little half inch adhesive brushes, but we found out this would never work since the stuff is so thick. We applied the sealant to one side of the wedge and then flipped it over and into the skins. We than applied it to the other side and we made sure to put a generous amount on the trailing edge rivets of each stiffener in case the shop heads rubbed.

Once the pro seal was all applied we sandwiched the skins to it and clecoed the assembly to the aluminum angle stock. This kept the trailing edge very straight and we made sure to cleco every hole. We also pushed down between each cleco to squeeze out any excess sealant.