Small workshop builders?

[ratc]

I had asked some while ago for S7 sti dimensions in order to gauge my work space but with few responses.

Another approach........ For those building in limited space, will my 17'6" x 12' 8" workshop be too small? Having built a Vans RV-4 in the same building I'm pretty well organised. As before I will have access to an aircraft hangar for final assembly.

All inputs gratefully received.

Ratc

[rcbif]

That would work, but it would be tight. Figure a wing on a stand takes up about 14ftx4ft, so with the roughly 4ft wide fuse tucked aside with parts around it, you only have about 4 extra feet of space to move.
Storing all the other bits elsewhere would greatly help.

I'm sure people have built in tighter spots, but you'll spend lots of time shuffling stuff to make room.

[rtc183]

Did my S7 in a 16 x 20 shop. Plan ahead and you can do it.
mykitlog.com/rtc183/

[aviator79]

I built in a 1-car garage slightly a bit longer than that (~20' x 10'). Your length of 17'6" will mean that you can't install your engine until you get it to a hangar. You will want to find somewhere you can store large parts you're not actively working on (wings, flaperaons, tail feathers). I hung some on the wall and stored others inside my house. I was able to get the fuselage tucked up close to a wall which left enough room to work on one wing on rotisseries. If you look up my build on in the members' builds section, you can get an idea how I worked in that area.

[Dave S]

We had a local Kitfox builder who did his work in a garage the size of Brian's. A little shuffling but did just fine.

One photo attached of our S7 in progress. The garage door was 7' high by 9' wide which meant that the prop would not go under the door. A trigear is also 8' at the tail so it couldn't go in and out of the garage on all three wheels. The little tail dolly balanced the height between the tail and prop so the plane could roll in and out of the door clearing the prop and the tail.

Worth noting that the wings in the folded position stick out in back a long way. Not having the wings attached inside a garage and maybe having the rudder & elevator off could provide some wiggle room on the nose/engine.

[Maverick]

I'm currently building a S5 in a 12 X 24 ft. shop. Garage door on one end. It is a challenge but if you've built an RV in that space you should be familiar with the amount of space required for that build. Now consider the difference in the size of the two planes. My challenge has been storage of components, i.e. where to put all those long, unwieldy, parts like seat pan, struts, cowling, windshield, fuel tanks, flaperons, longerons, leading edge, etc. while I'm working on fuselage or wings. When I built my shop I built it with 10' walls so I could use the rafters for storage of much of this stuff.

As was mentioned, the wing length and wing rotisserie racks will be such that you won't have space enough to store things around the ends of the wings. You'll need that space for working. And then, what do you do with the first wing while you are building the second? I just finished my left wing through the Polytone so, it is now on the rack rotated vertical and parked in the garage, much to my wife's chagrin, and the right wing is now on its rack in the shop, ready to varnish, install tank, cover, and paint. It too will have to go in the garage when it is time to install the engine and finish up.

Where's the fuselage while the wings are being built? I went to Harbor Freight and bought a couple of farm grade tarps and have the fuselage wrapped up like a mummy.
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Would I do this again? Probably not. By the time you put in a work-bench, storage cabinets, etc. the room you have to work with is really a disincentive to get in the shop and go to work. If you are not claustrophobic, you should be fine but, definitely challenged.