Chapter 22 – Kick plate finished!

Today I started out by pulling the GIB kick plate out to check the forward mounting bracket layup.

The mounting bracket looked good with the angle appropriate to how the lower corner of the cockpit is shaped.

I could tell by the bottom of the cured mounting bracket that not all of it was in contact with the taped fuselage corner . . . I guess gravity isn’t what it used to be!

I first drilled the #8 screw mounting hole through the kick plate and part way through the forward lower bracket when it decided to remove itself from the kick plate.  I then drilled and riveted a K1000-8 nutplate to the mounting bracket, and then trimmed all 4 bracket sides with the Fein saw.  Finally, I drilled anchor holes and sanded the bottom of the mount that will get floxed to the fuselage corner.

Here’s a few pics of the completed forward kick plate mounting bracket.

I then remounted the composite forward mounting bracket onto the kick plate.

Knowing that only a small portion of the mounting bracket had been in contact with the cockpit corner when I set it, I slathered it up with flox before remounting the kick plate.  I used fast hardener… so a few hours later after it cured I pulled off the kick plate to find that my mounting bracket floxing endeavor was successful.

While the kick plate mounting bracket flox was curing I took my fuel sump low fuel level sensor covers outside and painted them with the Rustoleum granite paint that I will be using for the interior cabin paint.

While the fuel sump low fuel level sensor covers’ paint was curing I called Mike at ACK to go over my ELT install configuration.  He gave me some very key information that will be very pertinent to my ELT installation.

I then determined the size of the phenolic LED light mounting reinforcement plates, cut them and then 5-min glued them into place (after I removed the paint and sanded the glass where they were mounted inside the covers).

I then determined where the 2 LED holes would be situated, then drilled the holes.  I tested out the angle of the LED light beams, so when I drilled the holes I made them a bit more horizontal in comparison to the aircraft waterline.

With the LED mounting holes ready, I then prepped the LED lights for mounting by soldering the red & white LEDs and wires, including a 470 Ohm resistor on the shared ground wired.

I then added heat shrink to secure & protect the solder joints.

Although the pic below looks like you’re looking down into a fiery volcano, I included this representative shot of the red LED test lighting.

Here’s the white LED test.  Again, the light showing up in these pics is more drastic, contrasting and harsh than what is really viewed in person.

Here are another couple shots of the sump low fuel sensor cover LED floor lights from the front, facing the camera (which I shot at an angle so they wouldn’t “blind” the camera).

Again, this is a representative view of the red & white LED lights glued in place into the right sump low fuel sensor cover.  The left looks pretty much the same of course.

Concurrent to the work I had been doing on the LED floor lights, I also primed & painted the kick plate with my gray cabin granite paint.  Over 4 hours later I hit it with a couple coats of matt clear coat.

This is about an hour later after the clear coat was dry enough to set the kick plate in place  to get this pic.

Here’s another shot of the painted and clear coated GIB kick plate.  BTW, I checked the weight of the kick plate just prior to painting it and it weighed in at a whopping 5.8 ounces.

Tomorrow I’ll continue my quest to finish all things GIB before moving on with other parts of the build.

 

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