Chapter 21 – Strake front baggage dams

Although I listed out all my remaining prerequisite tasks required before closing out the strake tops, I actually focused today on a task that was NOT on that list: strake baggage front dams.

I started out spending over a half hour with my Sharpie and cardboard dialing in the shape and position I wanted for the front strake baggage dams.  I know some guys put small lips right at the strake opening, but I want to be able to rest my arms in the strakes without them going numb.  I also wanted some elbow room so I set them back just a hair.

Last night I ripped some 3/8″ thick PVC foam down to 1/4″ thick to use for these baggage dams.  Here’s the final prepped foam cores for the strake front baggage dams.

I then set the foam cores above tightly together and added about an inch to make up a paper pattern to use to mark my BID for cutting.  Each dam gets 1 ply of BID.

I used thick micro with about 5 thick dabs of 5-minute glue to set the front baggage dams in place.  I then added a micro fillet to each side of each baggage dam before laying up a ply of BID on each one.

I also snagged the unused prepregged 2-ply BID I set up for the Vapor Box Clickbond and laid it up around the nose of the RAM air scoop exiting the strake leading edge.

I then peel plied all the layups.

A few hours later I pulled the peel ply and cleaned up the layups.

Here are a couple more shots of the front baggage dams from wider angles.

Finally, here we have the left strake baggage dam from the aft side.

With this task out of the way, tomorrow I’ll press forward to knock out more strake closeout prerequisite tasks.

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