I started off today looking everywhere for about an hour in the DC area for a friggin’ 1″ long 2-56 or 1-72 set of screws for the left side microswitch pair on the nose gear actuator.

No joy.  I called Fastenal, Grainger, etc. and no one had it.  Amazing.

I decided to press forward with the build and scrounge for the screws later on.  To be clear, I have 2-56 x 3/4″ screws on order with ACS that I’m fairly certain will work, but I wanted to try to get the gear up/down warning microswitch mounted today to get it checked off the list, especially since my ACS order won’t arrive for another day or so.

My first order of the day was to reinforce the areas on the aft corners and the front lip to better hold mounting screws.  I laid up a 2-ply BID pad on both back side corners and another at the lower front lip.

Apparently the epoxy estimator lobe in my brain is malfunctioning and once again I had way too much epoxy left over for the 3 small layups I did, even after peel plying them.

I was wondering what I should layup when the conversation that I had with my buddy Greg last night popped into my head.  I was explaining why I was working on the NG30 cover now vs later, primarily because I had much easier access to work on it since there are no sidewalls in my way.  Then it hit me suddenly: time to glass the forward NG30 cover!

I quickly put plastic in front of both the gear actuator and the NG6B gear strut pivot & taped them up to protect them from any errant epoxy.  I then grabbed duct tape and laid strips sideways over the hole, attempting to rid the surface contour of any fixable blemishes.  I then taped over the duct tape with foil tape and proceeded to lay up 4 plies of BID.  I then peel plied the layup.

I have to say that although there were some ridges on my “mold” due to the tape, after the 4th ply it was pretty darn smooth.  I then took a number of pics of the new forward NG30 cover.

Here’s what’s left of the foil after I popped off the cover.

And here’s the underside of the cover.

I then removed the peel ply.

I rough cut the edges with scissors and took a few more pics of it mocked up with the aft NG30 cover.

I then started working on the NG30 cover mounting to the NG30 gear box assembly.  The NG30 cover will mount with 6 x #8 sized screws (front, middle, back).

The back & front screw point configurations have the screws going through the NG30 cover skin into nutplate assemblies mounted on the NG30.  However, the middle set of mounting screws will start with a small hole in each side of the NG30s, with the screw going through the NG30 side into a nutplate that is mounted on a short tab that is in turn attached to the inside of the NG30 cover.

Here are the two mounting tabs that will get K1000-8 nutplates installed and will be mounted on the interior side panels of the NG30 cover.  I glassed them with 3 plies of BiD on one side & 2 plies of BID on the side that will get glassed into the NG30 cover, since that will add rigidity to that side for all but the bottom 1-1/2″ of the tab where the nutplate is.  The 5 total plies made for a very rigid, but still flexible mounting tab.

Here’s a shot after I installed theK1000-8 nutplates.  Also, in addition to these I made up 6 K1000-8 nutplate assemblies with phenolic bases (not shown).

I then drilled a hole into the side of each NG30.

And then installed the mounting tabs.  I’m working the installation of the mounting tabs a little backwards as you can tell.  The tabs go into the assembly first, and then will get mounted to the actual cover later.

To find out how wide I’ll need to adjust (add to) the width of the cover side panel before permanently attaching the tab, I merely slid it over until the mounting tab stopped it.

I then measured the gap and got a pretty close estimate of how much material will need to be in between the mounting tab and the interior of the side wall.

To know for certain where the tab was I placed a bright light behind the cover and simply traced the mounting tab onto the side of the cover.  I did this for both sides of course.

I then grabbed the AEX module and the SkyRadar ADS-B receiver and mocked them up on the NG30 cover.

Below is a shot of what I was really after here: I needed to know where to put the hard points on the inside top of the NG30 cover for the mounting of the Sky Radar ADS-B.

Lastly, here’s the final structural layup on the NG30 aft cover.  I prepregged two 1-ply pieces of BID for corner tapes, then 6 phenolic inserts that will serve to hold the ADS-B receiver in place, and finally, one large piece of BID.

The plan was to use flocro to secure the phenolic inserts into place, then glass a 1-ply BID corner tape over the inserts and the corners along the top and each side.

I spent a good half hour prepping the interior of the NG30 cover for glass by sanding it.

This shot shows all the phenolic inserts in place with flocro.  Again, I used florcro to get the weight savings of micro combined with the strength of flox.

Here’s a shot with the layup completed.  Again, this is the last structural layup for the construction of the aft NG30 cover.  In fact, the only layups I have left will be for the center mounting tab pieces onto the interior surface of each side panel.  I would have laid the mounting tabs up tonight, but it was late and that layup required me to surface prep the side panel glass with the Dremel tool.  And since I was already chided earlier this week from a neighbor very nicely inquiring if I was the cause of the loud power tool noises emanating from this end of street, I figured I’d better be good . . . for another week or so!

Tomorrow I should be able to finish the aft NG30 cover.  I’ll need to get it mounted to the NG30s, and then I’ll clean up all the nutplates, drill the mounting holes for the connectors, etc.

A NG30 cover that is!

Today I started out by checking the angle of the longitudinal axis with my digital level across the longerons.  I got a reading that said the right side (looking from nose to aft) needed to come up 0.2°.  This also gave me my baseline for checking the NG30 cover.

When I checked the NG30 aft cover it showed that it needed to come up 0.8° on the right side (again, looking nose to aft).  When I pressed down on the back left corner (as oriented in the pic below) I was able to take the number down a notch to 0.7°.

Now, I wasn’t trying to be a perfectionist here, but I did want to get it as close as possible, primarily because I’m fairly certain I’ll be mounting the Radenna SkyRadar-DX ADS-B IN receiver on top of the NG30 aft cover.  I want the top surface of the NG30 cover to match the longerons in longitudinal axis since the SkyRadar has a built in AHRS and needs to match the axes of this aircraft to provide attitudinal information.  Getting the cover as close as possible to the longerons will just make things easier when installing the ADS-B receiver, and help ensure better info if ever a backup attitude reference is required.

I slowly sanded down the edges on all sides at various points to get this cover dialed in.  I did focus on the left side (again, relational to the pic below).

And after about a half hour, success!   Add this time to the original half hour rough cut on the bottom edges after the sides were glassed and I spent about an hour total by this point on getting the cover level.

Here are a few shots of the level NG30 aft cover.  There are still some minor gaps that will be taken care of during the finishing process.

Now, I made an oops as I was ripping off the peel ply from the right side layup from last night.  It was pretty tough at one point so I put some muscle into it, and apparently some of my fingers where on the back foam plate because it gave way and the foam snapped.

Not really an issue since  I planned on removing this foam anyway.  Luckily, the foam broke into 2 big pieces, so I merely taped them back into place with duct tape.

Here’s my repair.  See?! Duct tape will fix anything!

Since I am removing most of the aft foam almost immediately after the glass cures, and then laying up the aft inside area of the cover, I went ahead and embedded some peel ply to ensure the main surface was prepped nicely for glass.

I then taped up a quick glassing tower for the layup (it was a bit wobbly if I really applied pressure since it was only taped to the protective plastic on my board, but this helped me keep my touch lighter on my improvised foam repair).

I cut out wedged-shaped trenches along the outer side edges and filled them with flocro.

I then laid up 3 pieces of BID in 2 plies.  The first ply is from the corner seam aft, the second is from the corner seam forward, making up the first ply of the layup.  The third piece of BID and second ply covers the entire area of the first two pieces of BID.  I wasn’t sure how well the BID would lay down in the tight 90° corner, so I split the first ply into 2 pieces.

Here’s the final result of the aft end layup.  I have to say I really wasn’t looking forward to this layup, but it turned out to be one of the better, more relaxing layups that I’ve done on this cover.

I also laid up 1 ply of BID on the backside of the second draft plate that I cut and glassed last night.

To mark where my nutplate assemblies will go on the right side of the cover, I grabbed my original template and punched holes with an awl everywhere it indicated a nutplate assembly mount.

I then simply marked the right side surface with a Sharpie through the holes I had just made in the template with the awl.

Since 2 of the new nutplate assemblies going inside the cover will be very close and adjacent to the aft layup area, I went ahead and prepped that area first before floxing & glassing in the nutplates.

I dug a bunch of foam out and then pulled the peel ply from the inside of the aft area.

Here’s a better shot of the foam & embedded peel ply removed.

I then finalized the prep of the aft area internal glass for a 1-ply BID layup.

Since I was still helping my buddy Greg with his Christmas tie, I didn’t get a chance to take a pic of this layup until an hour or so later,  If you look closely you’ll see that I installed 3 new nutplate assemblies on the right side panel, and embedded 2 pieces of phenolic on the aft pad where the AEX will get installed.

I then took a piece of phenolic that I had precut and mounted it the right side sandwiched between 2 x 2-ply BID prepregged BID tapes.  This mounting tab will house the permanent P2 connector coming from the main P1 connector at the front of the cover.  Then the AEX side P2 connector will plug into the mounted P2 connector.

I floxed and glassed two strips of 1/16″ phenolic in the back to serve as mounting hard points for the AEX box.

Here’s a shot of the nutplate assembly I glassed in last night (far corner) and the one I floxed & glassed in today (nearer camera)

I know I said I was going to be done with the NG30 cover today, but that was before my buddy Greg needed my help.  I think I should have almost all, if not all, of it completed tomorrow.

I started out today trying to lock down a bunch of hardware for the plane build.  It took a while to research some of the items –about 3 hours total– but I found a number of the items I was looking for and started compiling various orders for Aircraft Spruce, Mouser, etc.

I then went to the shop and pulled the peel ply from last night’s layup on inside of the front cover face.  I cleaned up peel ply boogers and a few rough glass edges.

I then set about to add the second microswitch (for the gear up/down alarm) to the gear actuator housing.  I pulled one of the screws from the current microswitch and when I went to put in a longer screw it was then that I realized that the set of screws I just ordered where the wrong size!

Here are the incorrect screws shown with the CORRECT microswitch.  Well, it looks like there’s a bit more research in my future!

Then, as if things weren’t pissy enough, I found that Napster stole the Christmas tie that I was making for my buddy Greg!  Ha!

So with the adding of the microswitch to the gear actuator assembly a total bust, I pressed forward with glassing the sides of the NG30 cover.  With the initial sides glassed with only one ply of BID, the sides are sunken inwards a bit.  So before I glassed the sides I wanted them set out about 0.050″ each side so that they would likely set a little straighter.  I cut 4 popsicle sticks to 3.67″ to make the outboard side-to-side measurement just over 3.7″.  Even if they cured a little bowed out that would be much better than sunken inwards.

Since there’s a bit of a gap at the cover’s bottom edge dogleg and the NG30’s dogleg on the left side, I wanted the glass to overhang the edge so I could cut it to the correct length after it cured,

Here’s the left side glassed with 2 plies of BID, and after the peel ply was pulled & it was razor trimmed.

To extend the glass lower on the right hand side I cut a foam extension & glued it in place with 5-min epoxy.

Here’s a shot of the right-side foam extension glued into place.  After it cured I sanded it to  ensure it was level with the existing outboard side glass surface.

I then laid up 2-plies of BID and peel plied it.

I overestimated the amount of epoxy required for my right side layup, so I had a fair amount  left over.  I grabbed a piece of 1/4″ thick PVC foam and glassed it with 2 plies of BID and then peel plied it.  This piece will serve as the lower of two draft plates to keep the cold air out.

Tomorrow I’ll work to finish up the NG30 aft cover: glass top inner BID tapes, nutplates, mounting tabs, etc.

I had a fair amount of running around today so I didn’t get much done.  I started by clearing out the foam from the inside front face of the NG30 aft cover.  My main concern was clearing the foam off the inside of the surface where the phenolic plate insert will go for reinforcing the glass when the gear actuator P1 connector is installed.

I sunk my razor knife into the foam when it hit me that I had not yet taken a pic of the inside of the cover with the added foam plug that allowed me to make the female side depression in the face of the cover for the P1 connector.  So I took a pic.

Just as I started in on my plane-building tasks my buddy Greg stopped by for a visit, and to also ask for my help in assisting him in making a Christmas tie in an attempt to win the “Best Christmas Tie” award at his work’s annual holiday party.  Last year we made it out of wood, so this year I though it would be cool to make it out of spare blue foam and glass it.  This burned up a few hours, along with just visiting & BS’ing in general.

Back to airplane stuff, I was able to clean out the foam & clean up the inside of the front face of the NG30 cover.

I then cut out the 1/16″ thick phenolic insert to embed in the layup to add strength to P1 connector mount.

I lightly sanded the phenolic plate on each side.  Once I got the phenolic insert ready to go, I then took a few minutes to prep a nutplate by embedding it into some H250 foam.

I laid up a small piece of BID just big enough to cover the phenolic insert after floxing the insert into place.  I then covered that small ply of BID and the rest of the inside front face with another large 1-ply of BID.  I overlapped the final ply of BID onto the side walls by a good 1-1/2″.

I then floxed the nutplate into the foam, and the entire nutplate assembly io the upper right side corner of the NG30 cover (lower right as the pic is situated here).  The large 1-ply BID just missed where I floxed in the nutplate, so I used a small patch of BID to cover the nutplate assembly and overlapped it about a half inch on the big BID piece that I had just laid up inside the NG30 cover.

I then peel plied the face of the glass covering the phenolic insert, and the very front of the BID play at the bottom lip of the front face (pardon the blurry pic).

I then cut 4 pieces of BID on the cutting table to layup on the cover sides tomorrow after I clean up this layup.

Tomorrow I’ll also install another 2-3 nutplate assemblies on the inside of the cover, all on the right side –at least for now– all for wire-containing Adel clamps.  I also have to work the glass on the cover sides to enable mounting the cover to the NG30s.

Today I started off by doing some research as I watched some football.  The first thing I had on my list to figure out was the exact configuration of my brake line components.  I did some poking around on the Matco website to figure out what components go where for my brake system.  I found the information I was looking for and was able to tailor it to the brake system components I have on hand.

Again, being a true Neanderthal and PowerPoint Ranger, I jimmied up a quick PowerPoint slide to display what was going on with the brake system.  One reason I was checking out my brake system is because I wanted to confirm what goes where in the nose so I can plan better as I build the NG30 aft cover, and will soon glass in the nose side walls.

I also spent about an hour doing some digging around online for information on my electrical system.  Really, I was focusing on a lot of the little bits n’ pieces that will be required to finalize the mounting of various stuff in the nose area, such as Adel clamps, and hardware to mount those Adel clamps: screws, nuts, bolts, washers, etc.

I also ordered two different sizes of heat shrink tubing for my shrink wrap label maker.  Now I have at least the first round of wire labeling for my wires ranging from 4AWG to 22 AWG.

I also updated my nose component diagram again and included it here.

I then headed out to the shop to razor cut the edges of the NG30 cover side panels.  Here’s the left one after I mocked it up on the NG30.

And here’s both trimmed side panels mocked up.

A side view of the NG30 cover side panels.

I then spent a few minutes figuring out what foam was going to get cut away & which foam would stay.  Here’s the marked up left NG30 cover side showing the foam cut lines.

Here’s the final foam trim for the left NG30 aft cover side panel.  Out of curiosity I weighed this side panel and it came in well under 1 oz.

I then double-checked the actuator motor housing clearance with it back on top of the left NG30.

Here’s a front view of the same.

I then cut out the 1/4″ front foam panel and the front top corner foam piece.  Below is a shot of the pieces mocked up to ensure that they fit.

I then attached these foam pieces to the left side panel using 5-min glue.

Piece by piece, I cut and then glued the top and aft blue foam panels into place on the left NG30 side panel.  I really focused on ensuring that these glued-in panels were truly perpendicular to the side panel.  Note that I intentionally cut the top front corner piece oversized to allow for sanding it down to a curve that’s “pleasing in shape” …. ha!

Here’s a shot of the NG30 aft cover after I glued in all the center foam panels & pieces.

And an aft side view.

After sanding the foam & glass edges to shape, I mocked up the cover on the NG30 nose gear box.

I grabbed the AEX box and put it in its spot to check how it fits.  Spacing looks good!

As I took a break for dinner, I was thinking about the front of the NG30 aft cover and had a mini epiphany.  I wasn’t sold on the straight horizontal positioning of the nose gear’s P1 connector.  I doubled-checked it when I got down to the shop and sure enough, the P1 connector would fair much better if it was positioned at an angle vs attached straight through the front panel.  Although I knew it would be a bit more work, I wanted to optimize the nose gear actuator’s P1 Amp/CPC connector’s fit into the NG30 cover.

I drew out the plan on a piece of cardboard, then transferred that to another piece of cardboard to make a template out of it — which looked like nothing more than an “S” if you  wrote it without any curves (a 3-lined zig-zag).  I transposed the template markings to the side of the cover.

I needed to make what essentially would end up being a male mold (lower) and a female mold (upper) in the front face of the cover for the BID to end up curing in the correct shape.  I made the front angled panel piece (lower/male) to match the profile of the template and markings on the side of the NG30 cover.  With that piece completed, it was then time to figure out how make the angled pocket (upper/female) to finish off the angled mount for the P1 connector.  I ended up adding an oversized chunk of foam on the back side of the front foam panel piece on the inside of the cover.  I 5-min glued it in place at the same time I glued the front “ramp” (male) piece in place, and stood there holding the two in place for about 5 minutes (what a coincidence!) until the epoxy set up.

Now, I have been contemplating how exactly to go about glassing the NG30 aft cover.  I wanted to get a good glass overlap, perhaps even an entire piece of BID over all of it, but the cured 5-min glue and the edges were being amazingly stubborn as I toyed with radiusing the corners.  I will say that I really do like the look of the sharp square corners, but I don’t like the idea of digging around in the confined nose space and smacking my arm on that sharp corner.  Oh, well, who cares how it functions as long as it looks awesome!  haha!

I mounted the NG30 aft cover assembly onto a 2×4 to ensure that this incredibly light assembly didn’t get away from me as I was glassing it.

I then cut a small trench along the corner edges and cleaned them up in prep for Flocro.

I mixed up some epoxy with fast hardener and then whipped up some Flocro with about 60% Micro & 40% Flox.  I used Flocro to keep it light but still have good strength in the corners.  I applied the Flocro along the edges of the foam in the mini wedge-shaped trenches that I had just created to make my “Flocro Corners.”

I then laid up 2-plies of BID on all but the very aft area of the center piece of the NG30 cover.  I had meant to take the layup farther aft, but the connector mount area took up a bit more glass than I thought.

I peel plied the entire layup since I’ll probably add one more ply of BID to this center section area.  I may even still radius the corners a bit and layup BID overlapping from the sides over onto the top & front center faces.

Here’s a shot of the aft side of the layup.

And another shot of the majority of the layup (there’s about a 1.5″ strip overlapping onto the angled panel that dives down into the notch for the AEX… shown in above pic).

Tomorrow I’ll work to finish up the myriad of little tasks that need to be completed to finish up this NG30 cover.  I estimate that I’ll finish this cover either Tuesday or Wednesday.

I started off today by testing the gear strut’s up & down travel limits.  To do this I clamped the NG4 bracket to the top of the gear strut with 2 “C” clamps.

Although a little difficult to see in this pic, the clearance aft of the nose wheel to the instrument panel is about 0.2″.

I also marked & sanded down the sides of the F22 gear strut channel.  I sanded about .06″ off the right side (left in the pic) and about .02″ on the left side to widen the channel just a bit more since there was some rub marks on the gear strut.

To figure out where the nose wheel should be in comparison to the fuselage, I clamped a 6′ level to fuselage aligned with F22 to essentially carry the F22 line down to the floor.  I clamped the level on the aft edge so that the level was perpendicular to the fuselage centerline (and not flat against the inward curving nose portion at F22…this made for a gap between the front inside edge of the level and the fuselage sidewall.  The back inside edge was flush with the fuselage side).

I then used a square to check the relationship between the nose wheel axle and F22.

According to the Long-EZ plans the axle should be at Fuselage Station: FS 17, so 5″ forward of F22.  It took me 3 adjustments of the down travel microswitch to get the axle moved forward to FS 17.

A close up showing square markings and the nose wheel axle 5″ forward of F22, making the axle location at FS 17.  I was actually shooting for a measurement of 5.2″ to 5.5″ (FS 16.5 to FS 16.8) on the square to make allowance for the weight of the aircraft compressing some of the natural gear spring action when on all its gears.

Here’s a shot of nose gear & wheel down at the correct level.

I then removed the gear strut to attach the NG3 & NG4 brackets.  Although plans calls for mounting the NG3 bracket at 6.71″ ± 0.05″ from the NG6B pivot point, after setting the microswitches for the up/down limits the measurement between NG6B and NG3 came out to almost exactly 6.3″.

I would have actually moved the NG3/4 bracket a little higher on the gear strut, but I wanted to keep NG4 inner bracket on the thicker, straighter part of the gear strut and minimize any weird, undue stress to the gear strut that might result from mounting it higher and at a narrower area.

The pic below shows the sanding that I did on the NG4 bracket before floxing it into place. Also, although hard to see, is the cardboard template I made of the inboard side of the NG4 bracket.  I’m hoping that I can use this to help drill the hole in the outer NG3 bracket, which comes un-drilled.

Here’s some better shots of the cardboard template.

Now, the original plans state that 2-3 plies of BID should be wrapped around the gear strut before floxing the NG3 & NG4 brackets into place.  However, the reason for this is simply because the original gear strut –as pointed out in the plans– was too narrow and the BID needed to be added to fill the gap.

Conversely, according to the installation instructions that came with the nose gear actuator, Jack mentions nothing about adding BID and simply says to flox the NG3 & NG4 brackets into place.  The NG3 definitely fit tightly enough that it could have easily been mounted with flox alone, but I like the idea of a ply of BID above and below the brackets to form a sort of hour glass configuration, if you will, to help lock the bracket into position.  It may just be in my head, but for a bit more peace of mind I decided to layup 1 ply of BID under the NG3 & NG4 brackets.

To add the 1 ply of BID, I had to sand the gear strut in the area that the NG3 bracket would be mounted.  I also prepped the rest of the area to ensure it was ready for mounting the brackets.

After laying up my requisite 1-ply of BID, I then mixed up some flox with fast hardener.  I applied the flox to the inboard areas of the NG3 bracket.

I mounted the NG3 outer bracket and the NG4 inner bracket with 2 “C” clamps.  I also added another clamp (as per plans) to bring the sides of the NG3 bracket in at the top side of the bracket.

Here’s another shot of the NG3/NG4 bracket mounting to the nose gear strut.

As the NG3 & NG4 brackets cured I sat down in front of the TV and cut up a bunch of 1/16″ phenolic pieces to make up some K1000-3 nutplate assemblies.  Eight of the 11 nutplate assemblies measure 1″ x 0.7″.  I’ll be using these for the electrical mounting plate that will be mounted just aft of the F22 center strut.  A couple of these will be used for the rudder cable hard points as well.  Finally, I’ll also be using a few of these to mount the NG30 cover.

I also made up a double K1000-3 nutplate assembly for the Matco parking brake.

Here’s a side shot of the parking brake nutplate assembly with AN3-11A bolts installed.

Tomorrow I’ll be glassing in nutplate assemblies for the electrical mounting plate aft of the F22 center strut.  I want to get these in before I glass in the nose sidewalls so that I have much easier access.  I also plan on working on the NG30 cover, again since I’ll have more access with the nose sidewalls not yet mounted.

I started out today by cleaning up the layups from last night.  I pulled the peel ply, razor trimmed & sanded the edges.

Then it was time for round two.  I cut out the pieces of BID for the other side of the draft plate and for the battery mounting tube 5-ply reinforcement pads.  I didn’t glass the face of  F4.1 since that occurs when it gets mounted to the aft side of the NG30 upright arms.

I then mixed up some epoxy with slow hardener and wetted out the BID.

The layups followed the same flow as yesterday.  Since I wasn’t in a hurry for this layup to cure I didn’t use a heat lamp… thus I went ahead and weighed it down with a gallon of paint.

Later in the evening Jack Wilhelmson returned my call.  After telling him the symptoms, he diagnosed the problem as me mixing up some wires on the switch side of the AEX P2 connector.  Sure enough, after we got off the phone I checked the wiring and had wired up the connector in the mirror image of how it was supposed to be.

Thinking that I had indeed found the problem, and then remedied it, I wired it all back up. It just so happened that the last step was to connect the AEX hot power wire to the battery.  Well, when I did I was met with a distinct & resounding “POP” sound.  Initially, I thought (and hoped) it was the 5-amp inline fuse that sounded off.  But alas, it was something on the AEX board.  I couldn’t see any physical damage but when I cracked the case I certainly could tell that I had let the smoke out of one the components by the smell.

Ok, so during our discussion Jack had told me that if no AEX unit is used then pins 5 & 6 on the P2 connector require a jumper across them.  I disconnected the AEX and then rigged up a jumper across pins 5 & 6.  I rechecked the rest of wiring, connected power and then hit the up switch.

Nothing.

It’s late in the evening now so I’ll have to wait until tomorrow to give Jack a call back and confirm both the AEX status and how to fix the persistent issue with the nose gear actuator wiring.

Once I get the nose gear actuator running correctly I’ll mount the motor into the NG30 gear box and then get the gear strut attached to the motor.