I really haven’t got a lot of actual work completed over the last couple of days, between doing a fair bit of research on the RAM air scoop design and configuration, pondering the hell hole hatch cover construction, and having my little buddy hanging around for multiple hours both today and yesterday.

I was able to pull the peel ply off the glassed-in-place armpit air intake scoops and clean up those layups.  I have to say I’m pleasantly surprised at how nice the transitions are between scoop structure and the bottom cowling.  A little bit of finishing micro —compared to what I thought would be a required lot— and the transition and flow between them will be as if it’s one solid component, especially after paint.

My next task was to clean up the inside transition edges between the armpit scoops and the bottom cowling edge flanges.  There was a good bit of flox that had to be shaped and removed, as well as some edges from the cowling opening.

After a good cleanup and sanding, I then measured and cut plies of BID to secure the inside perimeter edge of the armpit scoops to the inside edge of the bottom cowling, overlapping a good 3/4″ to 1″ on both surfaces.

I started with flox to fill in any gaps and imperfections at the junctions, and then laid up the glass.  I of course followed this up by peel plying the layups.

It seems like these 1-ply layups should have been an easy quick kill, but start to finish from cleanup to final peel ply in place was about 4.5 hours….. yes, where does the time go?!

Tomorrow I plan on jumping on the hell hole hatch and cover construction, as well as getting the RAM air scoop installed.