First off, my sad tale of woe: my build work day was cut infinitely shorter as I chose to assist my friend in taking her daughter Trick-or-treating for Halloween.  It was good to see her having fun with Jess, her son and other kids, but being the crotchety curmudgeon that I am, I secretly wanted to be in the shop getting this plane prepped for finishing.

As I’ve noted, one prerequisite task that I need to do is to get the canopy latch system squared away in final configuration to in turn allow me to base subsequent micro fill actions on and around the canopy on the canopy’s final closed position.

As I told my buddy Dave B. in an email I just sent, it seems as if the gremlins got into various parts of my build and moved everything around just enough to cause a required corrective action from me.  This includes the canopy latching hardware in that I had to refer back to old blog posts and videos to figure how in the heck I had installed it all before… since it just wasn’t seeming to fit or operate as I once had it.

I determined that the C4 block (or bracket) —that the CL-2 latching pivot hooks connect to and also interconnects the tube segments from one CL-2 to the other, as well the front canopy latch handle— was causing the segment of the tube that transitions through the top of the pilot seatback to bind, as it was just too tight no matter if the CL-2 hook was mounted on the outboard or inboard side of the C4 block.

Now, I could attempt to create a totally separate end bracket to the aft tube & CL-2 hook and simply offset the connection that way to relieve any pressure, but since I don’t have one on hand that would require making one.  Since I have the aluminum on-hand, I figured I would just create a modified C4 interconnecting block and call it a day.  So after a few initial measurements, I spent about 10 minutes ginning one up in Fusion 360 CAD.

And 3D printed it…

And tried it out in situ in the airplane.

I noted that when actuating the tube forward of the pilot’s seat I was still getting a decent bit of friction.  I determined that the offset in my newly designed C4 interconnecting block needs to be offset about 0.06″ more inboard to allow free, friction-free travel of the interconnect tube.  I also need to make the inset just a hair wider/longer to ensure the hook has full freedom of forward/aft motion. So back to CAD for a re-tweak, which I’ll hit later tonight or first thing in the morning.

I was able to get the rudders off the bird and outside for a thorough sanding in prep for applying micro to the surface for finishing.  After sanding I hosed all the dust off with water and then did a quick wipe down to remove the excess water.  I set them aside to dry as I closed up shop to “enjoy” (ha!) some Trick-or-treating!

Happy Halloween!

(boo!)

Today was another assessment and planning day in large part, as I’m looking at all the tasks that need to be completed before I jump into micro-finishing the top areas of the airplane.

On the winglet-to-wing fairing aft wall layup I pulled the peel ply off each of the layups before marking up each side for trimming.

I then trimmed along the top edge where it meets up with the rudder on the left side…

as well as the right.

Here’s an inside look of the cured layup and the trimmed fairing wall, first on the left side (pic 1) and then the right side (pic 2).

I also did a fair bit of refamiliarizing myself with my canopy latch system to get that installed and final to determine my configuration in the finishing on and around the canopy.

After some thought on my work flow, I sat down this morning and updated my task list in prep for micro-finishing the remaining surfaces of this bird.

In prep to pull the rudders off the winglets to do the inside wing-winglet fairing flange layups, I noted on each winglet that the top trailing edge was proud of the rudder TE by about 0.02″.  Not much, but noticeable.

So I marked the top winglet TE and carefully evened it up with the rudder trailing edge using a straight sanding board.

Although I didn’t work the top gap between rudder and winglet, I did check in the regular plans and the high performance rudder plans to see if it called out the gap dimension.  I couldn’t find anything, so I’m planning to use the 1/16″ gap that is called for in the Roncz canard plans.  Although I didn’t widen the top rudder gaps at this point.

I did however take about 30 minutes to widen the aileron-to-wing side gaps to 1/8″ as per CP #43.

I removed the rudders in prep for the inside (technically “outboard”) winglet-wing intersection fairing vertical flange 2-ply BID layup.  The first ply just covers the added dry micro (filler here, micro for weight) in the “trench” at the intersecting edge of original winglet notch for the rudder and new fairing flange.

Note, if you look closely you can see that I also removed the prop spinner and propeller.

I used the Fein saw and Perma-Grit sanding tools to clean up the transition between the original winglet notch for the rudder and new fairing flange, first on the left (pic 1) and then the right (pic 2).

After cutting 2 plies of BID per side, and laying in drier micro in the intersection gap, I laid up the BID on the left fairing (pic 1) and the right (pic 2).

I then peel plied both layups… here is the left side peel plied.

I also noted that there is a slight difference in elevation between the winglet surface and the rudder near the top of the right rudder.  To bring the surface elevation back into alignment I added 2 plies of BID to the inside top rudder hinge pad.  I then peel plied the layup.  I’ll assess after it cures.

To ensure that the proper alignment for the inboard rudder edge is maintained with fairing vertical flange, I taped the bottom inside edges of the rudders with clear packing tape and then reinstalled the rudders.  I taped the rudders firmly into place, again to ensure that they sit perfectly flat against the inside fairing flange.

I also spent a good hour+ assessing the forward canopy fit with the aft nose/avionics cover and the forward fuselage near the longerons.  Clearly something was lost in translation when I did the final securing of the aft nose/avionics cover because there is wider gap between the front edge of the canopy skirt and the recessed glare shield portion of the aft nose cover.  The gap is more pronounced on the left side, being about 0.15″ wider than on the right.

In addition, I’m not overly thrilled with the original top curve of the longeron, since my canopy frame is more vertical (more French style) than the original lower, flatter, horizontal style canopy frame.  Since I’m getting ready to do the final finish on this bird, now is the time to remedy all these issues.

Besides filling the gap forward canopy skirt gap with the aft nose cover (and possibly reworking the glare shield aft raised rain blocking edge/seal), I will most likely fill the top longeron along the forward canopy edge to create a small flange and even up the flow between canopy and top fuselage (near the longeron).

Now, to do all this, the canopy needs to be set in its no-kidding final locked configuration.  This means ponying up and finishing the canopy latch assembly now —before micro-finishing— versus later as I was thinking.

Yep, still pressing forward!

Today I finished editing and posting my 2nd-to-Final Major Project Update video on YouTube.  It’s a rather long video, probably the longest video I’ve made, but it’s fairly comprehensive in detail on the engine install and other completed tasks.

Here’s the video:

With the video knocked out, tomorrow I plan on getting back onto the actual build.

Pressing forward!

I’ve spent the last few days prepping for my major project update video.

Besides giving the workshop a good cleaning and organizing, I also mounted the canard, canopy, aft nose/ avionics cover and nose hatch door.  I also put the front seat cushions and temporarily taped the headrest pads in place.

I also pulled tape off the canopy, wingtip NAV/strobe lights and a number of other places.

I vacuumed out the engine compartment and wiped down a good bit of the engine components.

I also mounted the wheel pants (airing up the tires first), RAM air scoop and prop spinner.

As you can see in the background, I also hung sheets of plastic around the bird to mitigate the dust from getting everywhere when I sand the micro finish to contour on all the top surfaces.

Although I did record a couple segments of the major project update video last night, I knocked out the remainder of the video this evening.

I then got to work editing the video.

Tomorrow I plan on having the video edited, complete and uploaded to YouTube, at which time I’ll get back to work on the plane.

This blog post covers that last few days.  I’ll start off by noting that yesterday I was unexpectedly asked by my friend Shelly to take her to an appointment down in Wilmington to remove stitches from her recent foot operation.  Needless to say, that pretty much wiped out my shop time for any tasks other than some general cleanup and hanging some dust-retaining plastic for my upcoming micro-finishing ops.

Rewinding a few days: I wanted to get some layups knocked out as I’ve got a few iterative rounds of final fitting of the top cowl front edge to the turtledeck coming up.  My original plan for the right side where the top cowl oil cans between 2 CAMLOCs, leaving the interfacing turtledeck surface low, was to build up the turtledeck somehow…. but then I decided to underfill the top cowling front edge from inside to fill in the air gap and simply sand down the outer surface of the top cowling level with the turtledeck.  Again, this will almost certainly be an iterative process, but in the end I think it will work much better than adding more material to the turtledeck.

I started with 3 stepped plies of carbon fiber on the inside right front edge of the top cowling.  I realized when I started to pull the peel ply that I had failed to grab some pics, so here is peel ply coming off (pic 1) and after cure with the peel ply off and CAMLOC holes clear again (pic 2).

I started the process to a much lesser degree on the left side as well, with a long single ply of CF to help fill in a slight gap, then another semi-circular ply on the inboard side (right in pics below).  Again, carbon fiber layup with peel ply (pic 1) and after cure with the peel ply removed, razor trimmed and CAMLOC holes clear (pic 2).

I had a little bit of epoxy left over in my cup, which as you probably know by now I hate to waste, so I did a quick 2-ply carbon fiber layup for the bottom lip of a GIB seatback hole cover that I will construct over time.  Here it is with peel ply on the underside and topside of the layup.

And then after cure with the peel ply removed, but not yet trimmed to shape.

Again, I started hanging plastic in prep for all the dust I’m going to create when micro-finishing the top of the bird in prep for painting.  I started by specifically hanging the plastic in the areas around the nose of the plane that would be hard to do with the canard in place.

Oh, by the way, note that I pulled the canard out of the house and installed it on the bird.

Also clearly visible is the aft nose/avionics cover and recently sanded nose hatch door in place.

Nothing is ever accomplished without sacrifice, and for me I spent well over half an hour looking for the baggie with all the aft nose/avionics cover hardware.  Even then, about half the CAMLOCs were missing so I spent nearly an hour in trial and error fitting of CAMLOCs to “finalize” fit (not all, since paint may require a few CAMLOC size changes).  To avoid playing the ever-so-fun “find me if you can” game, I created an Aft Nose/Avionics Cover Hardware Card like I have for both cowlings, RAM air scoop and wheel pants.

Besides finalizing my task list for such things as the aft nose/avionics cover, nose hatch cover, canard, elevators, etc., my installing of all these on the bird is a final pre-micro finish hurrah for one of the final major project update videos I’m about to record.  This is the first time during this build that this airplane will have all the major components (minus panel) installed together in essentially a “flight ready” status… and I want to capture it in the video.  Yes, I admit it’s for bragging rights, motivational fun and build status documentation all in one.

Speaking of documentation, I had compiled a video while I was constructing the exhaust pipe brackets and was waiting for James to do the final welding on the brackets before I posted the video.  However, James is neck deep in moving his business operations to a brand new just-built shop, and I know he’s super busy.  I wanted to get the exhaust pipe bracket video out before I post the major project update video so the sequencing wouldn’t be weird or out of order, so I finalized the exhaust pipe bracket video and uploaded it.  Here it is.

And with that, I’m going to get back to my shop cleanup and final task prep for my major project update video.  Once I’m done with the video, I’m pulling and bagging the engine and then rolling into micro-finishing the fuselage, strakes, wings and winglets.

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, Jess and I went out of town for a good portion of the day today, so I obviously didn’t get much done in the shop.

That being said, I did get the bottom cowling removed and then re-installed the exhaust pipe brackets in prep for my upcoming major project update video.

I also pulled off the taped metal block that I used to weigh down the carbon fiber clip layup inside the top cowling that will secure the wire push-pull handle that opens and secures the oil check door.

Here we have the cured carbon fiber clip on the inside of the top cowling, still yet to have the peel ply pulled or clip trimmed to shape.

After getting the clip layup cleaned up, I figured the easiest way to describe it in action was to simply show it in operation.  Here’s a short clip (pardon the pun) of it in action.

As I noted in the video description, this clip will keep the oil check door securing wire in place during flight to ensure that 1) the door stays closed and 2) the wire doesn’t work its way out of the cowling to interfere with the prop [note: it shouldn’t due to its length being intentionally too short to enter the prop arc].

Tomorrow I plan on getting a few more tasks out of the way, again, in prep for my major update video…. after which I’ll get to micro finishing the top side of the bird.

I started off today by pulling the weights and the tape off the oil check door… so far at this point the egregious fitting of the first door configuration has been remedied, with the door secured very closely in alignment with the surrounding top cowl surface.

Before I freed the oil check door into the open position, I wanted to have it physically secured to the hinge tab (with more than just flox and glass) so I prepped 2 stainless steel cherry pop rivets by shooting them with primer.  Hopefully this will eliminate or at least mitigate the galvanic corrosion that can happen between steel and/or aluminum with carbon fiber.  I have to note here that that’s one of the big downfalls of carbon fiber.

Here I’ve drilled out the previous rivet holes and installed 2 of the 4 rivets on the door: the forward and middle one.  I’ll wait a good few days for the flox to really cure before doing the other ones.  I also replaced a cowl-side hinge soft rivet that was a little proud of the surface as well.

There was just a tad flow of flox from mounting the door to the hinge, with both of those secured in the closed position… but a little gentle prying on the aft side of the door popped it right open.

I then closed the door and secured it with the wire securing latch, and yes this is actually a pic of that to show my oil check door seating is no longer all cattywhompus.

After a good deal of assessment and some test runs, I then bent the wire 90° and trimmed it just under 1.5″ long.  I welded a semicircular push-pull tab onto the wire and then primed and painted the tab.

I had to run out and pick up my friend’s daughter and take her back to her house, and also stopped by the grocery store for some stuff on the way back.  This gave the yellow paint a good bit to dry, and I carefully tested out the oil check door wire securing “latch” operation… I’m happy to report that it worked a treat!

With my oil check door wire securing “latch” operationally good, I then proceeded to tack weld a small safety tab in position to keep the wire from exiting too far out the aft end of the cowling into the prop.  Well, that was the goal of this task.

Between a slight rock of the welding table —which I remedied— and then having to work the TIG welder pedal while standing, I had an issue with the pedal snagging up on the table crossbar as I was cycling the pedal up and down during my welding.  Although I wasn’t getting a good burst on the tack weld, after a couple of cycles the metal was warmed up.  Then the pedal final came off its crossbar snag, let loose, and went “full throttle” on the warm wire —blasting it in half.

I then spent a good 15 minutes of improvisational welding to get the wire set back into position… resulting in ugly but hopefully strong welds to secure it back in position!  What a PITA!

Here’s my final <ugly> safety tab/GLOB weld on the oil check door securing wire.

Now, over the past week I’ve been pondering how to secure the aft end bent push-pull wire to the inside of the top cowling as both a safety measure so that it doesn’t work its way aft (or release the oil check door), and to keep down on vibrational chatter on the side of the cowl.

I decided to go with a simple clip that the wire snaps into when the oil check door is secured closed.  That resulted in an assessment on whether that clip should be metal or composite.  I landed on simply laying up 3 plies of carbon fiber to create a securing clip (think tape measure belt clip) on the inside side wall of the top cowling.

Here’s that layup with a taped metal block to keep the carbon fiber pressed down to the underlying mold.

As you can see, I laid up the carbon fiber (using hi-temp HTR-212 epoxy) and then peel plied the layup.

I also hit the yellow tab with a couple more coats using a brush.  I then left the layup and paint to cure overnight.

Tomorrow I’m attending an event with Jess that will eat up most of the day, and then after that my week should open up to get more stuff done! (hopefully).

I started out today by spending a bit of time straightening and angling the flat piece of the hinge that mounts to the oil check door (part with rivet holes).  The hinge gap on this flat piece towards the aft end of the door was a bit more than the front side, which was pretty much pressed firmly against the door.  Again, since the hinge is aluminum getting mounted to carbon fiber, I needed a buffer piece of BID in between to keep any galvanic corrosion from occurring over time.

So I simple added a couple of BID plies and stepped them so that they were thicker on the aft end, at the very slight gap betwixt door hinge and door (I actually added a triangular filler ply of BID, so officially 4 plies at the very aft end).  After wetting out the BID, I then slathered on some as-wet-as-feasible flox and floxed the hinge back onto the oil check door.  I’ll note that the hinge spring is in place, and since the door wire catch was in place as well as the door being firmly taped closed with Gorilla duct tape… installing that spring was no small feat!

I let the epoxy/flox cure for about 30 minutes as I cleaned up the excess oozing flox from around the flat hinge piece edges.  With the hinge refloxed to the door, I mounted the top cowl with all the CAMLOCS and screws installed and again placed weights on the oil check door to keep it as tightly pressed to the top cowling as possible.  I then left it to cure.

I spent the next couple of hours slowly dialing in the fit of the prop spinner by carefully removing any material that kept it from seating on the flow guide properly, or didn’t allow enough clearance with the respective prop blades.

Once the prop spinner prop blade opening clearances were good, I got to work on the front-of-blade gap filler pieces.  I had assumed (yes, we all know what “assume” means!) improperly that my buddy Dave Berenholtz would be using a Silver Bullet, and/or never gave it any serious thought.  The bottom line is while he has the same prop spinner, his prop configuration is such that the gap filler piece is much narrower than mine.

Since I based my dimensions off of his, my resulting 9-ply gap filler piece stock layup ended up being too narrow and too tall overall.  It should have been about an inch less in height and about 2.5″ wider.  Nonetheless, I could clearly get at least one of the  front-of-blade gap filler pieces out of it, so after finalizing the template I marked up the first one (pic 1) and cut it out (pic 2).

The longer side of this gap filler piece (lower in pic below) did not work out well on the first side, and with the overall opening just a hair narrower (about 0.050″) on the other side, I transferred the #1 gap filler piece above to the other side (#2) and fitted it into place.

Now, although the spinner curves a bit more as it departs the junction with the flow guide, I decided to check out how the other front-of-blade gap filler piece would turn out by simply cutting it out of my 9-ply stock… only in reverse to keep it as close to the front side of the stock as possible.  Thus, I marked up the second (new #1) prop gap filler piece.

And cut it out and fitted it into place.  Not perfect, but not bad.  Which is the exact descriptor that I will offer up for this entire prop spinner install effort.

Here we have the prop spinner installed, with the prop blade openings cut with good (or too good… read on) clearances.

And the requisite direct aft pic.  With the top cowl mounted this shot shows the actual clearance between top cowl and prop spinner flow guide: again, 3/8″.

Hindsight is always 20/20, and knowing the results now I would have approached the final prop spinner fitting a bit differently, focusing all the trimming on the right side of the blade in the first pic below.  Let me explain: with the screws installed, I would have then shifted the entire prop spinner counterclockwise to close up the slightly wider gap on the right side of the blade.  No, it won’t break the bank, but it is slightly wider than I desired. Pic 2 is a shot of the other side.

That being said, for some reason the 4 pre-installed mounting screw positions are all #6 screws, while included in the kit were #8 screws and platenuts.  Since I’ll be swapping out the #6 screws for #8 prop spinner mounting screws I plan to bias the holes CCW by about 0.02-0.03″ to balance out the clearance gaps around both prop blades.

Now, THAT all being said, here we have a wider angle shot of today’s activities: newly reset oil check door (hopefully comes out set as it should be on the cowling!) and installed prop spinner!

Tomorrow I’ve got a morning phone call with a good friend of mine, rolling into taking my little buddy to a county fair, and ending with an evening out with Jess…. so no more than checking the oil check door cure is in cards I imagine.  Sunday I’ll again be playing chauffeur to my little buddy for a round trip to her friends’ house (reminder: her mother had foot surgery and can’t drive).  So another somewhat impacted build day.

Nonetheless, pressing forward!

It’s been a slow couple of build days and I’m hoping to get some more solid work time in the shop, albeit more social events coming this weekend and Monday (sigh).

I was able to get a rather intricate task knocked out in the cutting of the prop blade notches in the Catto carbon fiber prop spinner.

I started by aligning the prop blade notch template with 2 of the 4 screw holes that are currently installed on the prop spinner and flow guide… the screws visible on each lower, outer edge in the pic below.  With my cut line known, I then placed green painters tape under the cut outline of the template to draw my cut line.

Here we have the cut line marked on the prop spinner, again spaced on 2 of the 4 pre-existing screw mounting holes (pic 1).  I then used the Fein saw to cut out the first of two prop blade cutouts for my Hertzler Silver Bullet prop (pic 2).

It took a good 45 minutes (yes, that long!) of measuring and aligning the second prop blade cutout in relation to the first, while simultaneously keeping it “centered” and aligned with the last 2 of 4 pre-existing screw mounting holes.

When I finally took the plunge, uh, literally, with my Fein saw to cut out the second and final prop blade cutout/notch, I had my fingers crossed (and a quick prayer) that my measurements were right.  Yep, measure 17 times and cut once . . . and Voila!

I was fully aware that my prop blade notches would most likely be tighter than they will be in final configuration, but better to remove material on final fitting than having to add eh?!

Moreover, I’ll note that in all these gratuitous installed prop spinner pics that the top cowling is NOT mounted in any way, and is merely loosely placed in position.

Here’s one more side shot to provide a general idea of how the prop spinner will look once finally installed.

Ok, tomorrow I am planning to get some good progress on both prop spinner final configuration AND oil check door hinge-to-door reattachment.

Limping along….