Another 100° shop day…

I note the heat because it really does have an effect on the build: between being drenched head to toe in sweat (light green on bottom of shirt is the actual color!) and trying not to have sweat pouring off of you into layups, micro fills, etc.  Not to mention just the toll it takes in energy to get this stuff done.

On the underside right wing, along the edge just forward of the aileron, I finally got the offending boat paint primer and micro fill knocked down to get the wing surface level with the bottom aileron surface across their intersecting gap.

This is yet again another multi-day post here, and it’s taken 3-4 good sanding sessions to get the wing surface knocked down to an allowable surface depth to get to a decent “level” ruler across the joint.  I’ll note to get the final sanding task done I resorted to using my belt sander to very carefully remove the very hard primer and micro.

 

Back in my shop I’ve gotten back to work on the aft nose/avionics cover front and aft edges to the nose (front) and canopy skirt (aft).  Here you can see some pencil lines on the front edge of the cover to be sanded down off the bird to get it close to the level it needs to be for a nice smooth transition across the seam.  Once I’m very close, then I’ll simply hand sand across the seam.

Here we have the aft nose/avionics cover aft lip that interfaces with the front edge of the canopy skirt.  This aft lip is also marked with pencil lines for sanding (round 2).

Here we have the left canopy to longeron seam.  It doesn’t show up on camera that well, but I need to do more work and add some micro to this left canopy frame-to-longeron seam since the gap is just too large…

And this is after spending a good 45 minutes each side sanding the rounded corner edges of the Turtledeck and aft longeron to get the canopy to seat correctly back in place and lock fully with the canopy latch.  Note the top of the Turtledeck is just a hair proud, and this area too I’ll be sanding across the seams (the canopy frame needs repainted anyway).

Getting ready for the upcoming soon primer and paint, I’ve been taking care of all the myriad of blemishes around the bird.  Here I’ve filled a slight dip on the edge of the left winglet fairing “TE” with micro, then sanded it down after cure.  I epoxy wiped it with a couple of coats to ensure no pin holes.

A couple of years ago I spent a good bit of time measuring my entire bird to get it as straight, balanced and symmetrical as possible between left and right wings, et al.  This meant adding another thick washer for a total of two each to the outboard wing bolts on the left wing. This made the bottom wing gap with the strake significantly wider than it was prior: >1/8″ versus the previous <1/16″.

To extend the bottom wing flange edge forward at this junction, I laid up a ply of BID across the pre-existing flange and let it cure with some overhang.  I’ll add 0.1″ of flocro to the front of the bottom lip to fill in this widened gap resulting from the extra wing bolt washers.

I also should have paid a little bit more attention when epoxy wiping the bottom surface of the left aileron.  Once again, being in a rush cost me in the end.  I had a few significant drips that ran down onto the face of the already sanded-for-paint topside surface.  In the resulting removal of these offending epoxy drips, I cut through the surface on the top edge for a couple inches and also on the front face of the aileron, both requiring subsequent micro fills (sigh!).

I filled about a 1/4″ high by 3″ long strip on the right sidewall just below where the canard exits out of the nose.  Although not in a very noticeable spot, I just wanted to get this depression even with the rest of the surface of the sidewall… so a quick micro add, then sanding.  Here it’s been epoxy wiped a couple coats.

Back to the aft nose/avionics cover… here we have it after the 3rd round of edge sanding, with some areas both on the cover and adjacent to it on the fuselage that needed some added micro.  There are a few more required touchup areas that I’ll get to, I just wanted these cleared out of the queue first.

A final look at the aft nose/avionics cover intersection seam with the forward nose.  Looking pretty good, with a few minor tweaks left.

I will note that the final cover configuration won’t be complete until I get the no-kidding final surface of the canard dialed in to as near-perfect as possible, since it is a very critical —if not THE critical— flying surface on this bird.

Tomorrow I plan on slathering up the underside right wing with micro, as well as a good swath down the center of the bottom right aileron as well. Once those are sanded, then a final epoxy wipe and ti will be close to ready for paint for the right wing.

Yep, still pressing forward!