There were over eighty ribs to be attached to the two frames of the aeroplane. At intervals of about a foot, the front end of each strip was screwed to the top of the forward beam. Extending the strip back over the rear beam, it was made fast there with screws. Two feet of the free end of each strip extended beyond the rear beam. These having been put in place, there was a hasty smoothing of all timbers with sandpaper and another coat of shellac and when Saturday night came, the big skeleton-like, fragile-looking frame, which almost filled the big boatshed, was locked up with the feeling that the hardest work had been accomplished.
By Tuesday night, both planes had been covered. The muslin, cut in full six-foot pieces, had been soaked in Andy’s waterproof solution (equal parts of alum and sugar of lead) and dried. Then one end of a piece was glued to the front edge of the beam and fastened with copper tacks. Carefully the strip was drawn back, and, as it was stretched skin tight, made fast with small tacks to the ribs. The rear end was turned under and glued to prevent raveling.
“This is worse than ribbin’ her,” panted Andy more than once as he pulled at the muslin. “And I reckon the bottom ain’t agoin’ to be any easier.”
Nor was it. But when the work was done, the result of a week’s labor began to look like an aeroplane. The muslin was now treated to a good coat of varnish, which turned the white stretches to a golden brown color.
The next step was the bracing of the frame with wires. Suitable metal plates, with hooks, to be attached to the stanchions to afford points for holding the wires, were not available. Therefore, these were made out of sheet steel by Andy and Captain Anderson in the shop over on Goat Creek. Screw holes were bored by the hand drill found there, and an edge of each sheet was turned into a hook by heating the metal in the forge and blue-tempering the plate afterwards.
Progress seemed to be slower now, but the interest in the work increased in proportion. When all the open spaces between the stanchions had been crossed with diagonal wires tied to the steel plates at the top and bottom of each upright and the turn-buckles had been inserted in the middle of each length of wire, the proud artificers were ready to key the unstable frame into rigidity.
This was a most delicate task. Truing the long frame on the floor and squaring its vertical parts with a level, the task was to tighten the wires without warping the sections.
“It’s like tunin’ a piano,” laughed Andy.
“Or tightenin’ a sawbuck,” suggested the captain.
Then Andy discovered that the tightened, straining wires were acutely vibrant, and he began to test his work by twanging the wires with his fingers, like the strings of a harp.