It’s been quite chilly the last couple of days, so no major composite work in the shop, although I did get some smaller tasks done utilizing heat lamps.  It’s forecasted to be warmer for a couple days coming up, which is when I plan on epoxy wiping the left wing and winglet.

Since it’s cooler in the shop —and given that I want to embed some threaded inserts into the top of the left wing as hard points, pre-epoxy wipes, for mounting a video camera— today (and last night) entailed a lot of lathe work.

Since I’m out of any stock of “baggage pod” threaded inserts from the Cozy Girrrls, I decided to make some myself.  That being said, I should have paid more attention to their dimensions since a while back I ordered some 1/2″ aluminum 7075 and 2024 rods thinking off the cuff that that’s the natural diameter they’d be… uh, a quick check on the Cozy Girrrls’ site and I realized they use 3/8″ diameter stock, vs 1/2″.  And why waste metal and add any weight if not required.  Thus, I punted and did the first batch with some 3/8″ diameter 6061 aluminum I had on hand.

After some knurling, I started by drilling the center hole out (pic 1) to tap the 10-32 threads (pic 2).

Unlike the Cozy Girrrls I added some flox grooves on the side to give the inserts a bit more of hold inside the drilled hole (pic 1).  I then parted off the threaded insert and started the process all over again (pic 2).

Here we have a 3/8″ diameter 6061 aluminum threaded insert, replete with flox grooves in the side.  It’s a little hard to tell, but another improvement I made was that the end that goes into the hole is enclosed, so no more having to tape up that end before installing it.

Another couple shots of the threaded inserts I’m making.  Again, at this point specifically for securing some camera mounts to the outboard wing tops, and also on the top of the left winglet.

First two threaded inserts, hot off the lathe!

I placed an order for some more 3/8″ diameter 7075 and 2024 rods, among a bunch of other bits and pieces, that will come in Monday.  I didn’t want to wait to make some threaded inserts a little more robust than 6061, which is fine (probably for all the inserts in reality) but I wanted one in each pair to be higher strength 7075 or 2024.  I decided on the 7075, which I turned down from 1/2″ diameter to 3/8″… enough for 2 more threaded inserts (pic 1).  I then knurled the surface to provide a textured surface for the flox and micro to grip (pic 2).

And here is the sum total of last night’s and today’s efforts: 5 threaded inserts (3x 6061 and 2x 7075). [Unfortunately the lathe was giving me some grief that I had to contend with, so it took a few hours longer than I had planned… sigh].

After drilling 3/16″ holes on each end, I pulled the cured left wing video camera mounting base off the wing surface.  I prepped a 7075 threaded insert, applied grease to the screw threads, added some clear packing tape to ensure a good release, and drilled the forward hole out to 3/8″.

I added flox towards the top side of the threaded insert, with some flox also into a widened spot right under the wing skin (think washer, or donut) to lock in the insert.  On the bottom half of the hole, since it’s all wing foam in there, I simply used micro to set the threaded insert.  I then inserted an AN3 sized screw into the aft hole to ensure it was aligned correctly (pic 1). I then weighed the forward hole down to ensure the threaded insert was set in place and cured nicely (pic 2).

I’ll note that due to the curvature of the wing, and thus video camera mounting base, I’m installing one threaded insert at a time.

I then determined the position of the right wing video camera mount, which is a little more than an inch further outboard than the left side.  Since the right wing is already epoxy wiped, I put down a piece of yellow adhesive to ensure no errant epoxy gets on the wing.  I then marked the position of the video camera mount and added clear plastic tape over top of the mark.

I then wet out a piece of peel ply first, then 5 plies of glass (BID-UNI-BID-UNI-BID) just as I did on the left side (pic 1) and finalized the layup with peel ply on top (pic 2).

With all my composite work out of the way, I finally got around to the initial sanding of the epoxy wiped strakes to knock down the slathered on epoxy.  As I did on the right wing, I used my orbital sander with 80 grit to carefully knock down the epoxy wiped surface.  I did have a couple break throughs on the left strake, as well as nicking the left wing’s leading edge, so I will be doing some re-filling and re-sanding on those spots.

I plan on wet sanding the strakes with 150 grit tomorrow, as well as continuing to prep the left wing and winglet for epoxy wipes.

Since I was up until the wee hours of the morning doing the epoxy wipes on both the left and right strakes, I got a late start to my build day.  I also had an early afternoon appointment to get some new tires on my vehicle, so that put even a bigger notch into my afternoon build activities.

Thus, I finally made it out to the shop early evening.  Again, I’m very pleased with how the strakes worked out with the epoxy wipes, especially considering my biggest problem area finishing wise is/was the aft inboard corner of strake, where the wing/strake/top cowl all intersect.  To get this close to ironed out is a big relief and will really be a huge milestone in THIS Long-EZ build.

Specifically here, note the level surface of each strake… looking pretty good in my book.

At some point I was pondering how exactly I am going to cover the wing bolt access ports on the top and bottom of each wing.  I will most likely go ‘ol skool and simply make these covers out of thin aluminum (most likely plasma cut, then painted) or 2 plies of CF… either way they’ll be thin, feather light, and silicone RTV’d into place.

I used some scrap paper to trace the outline of the right wing’s bolt access port, scanned and uploaded that into Fusion 360 CAD and then added 1/4″ extra around the perimeter for a small overlapping lip where it will get RTV’d to the wing.  I put a big hole in the middle simply to save plastic, print time and have an inspection port for my finger if need be.  I then 3D printed the wing bolt access port cover mockup (pic 1) and then test fit it on the right wing’s bolt access port (pic 2).  I think this dog will hunt, and at some point in the near future I’ll make up a batch of these covers.

Now, an issue that I needed to tackle immediately, before I can move forward with micro finishing the right side top cowl interfacing shoulder bump is the rather significant oil canning I have right along this top cowling to fuselage-side shoulder bump.  With the CAMLOC removed at this spot, and thus the natural resting cowl position with no oil canning, I could see at least an 0.08″ gap between top cowl and flange that needed to be filled.

I started with a 3-ply stepped BID layup on the shoulder bump cowl flange side, laid up the glass and then peel plied it (pic 1).  On the inside lip of the top cowl, I also added 3 plies of carbon fiber at the shoulder bump, and peel plied that layup as well.  Also on the top cowl front edge I had a little bit of a break through when I sanded it down level with the turtledeck, so I added a couple of half-moon shaped plies of CF for filler and peel plied that layup as well (pic 2).

Jumping ahead a few hours, here’s the right side top cowl shoulder bump mounting flange with the cured 3 plies of BID.  I razor trimmed the overhanging glass and pulled the peel ply.  Tomorrow I’ll re-drill the CAMLOC hole (which has Saran wrap stuffed into it to protect against any errant epoxy).

Although not a direct build action, a significant task that I needed to tackle tonight was cleaning up the tons of micro dust and piles of micro powder that was currently everywhere within the plastic hanging sheet protective space I made for this micro finishing process.  Although the entire shop does have a thin layer of micro dust on EVERYTHING, it is much less outside the hanging plastic barriers than inside in and around the plane.

Here is the left side area of the plane, where I still need to make some more dust as I will be doing the final sanding of the left winglet and wing-winglet fairing.

I added the shot above really to contrast it with the ~2 hour cleanup I did on the right side —both sweeping and shop-vacuuming— to get the vast majority of that micro dust off the floor, etc.

And the main reason I did the major cleanup on the right side was I needed to commence wet sanding the right wing and winglet with 150 grit sandpaper (again, as per Cory Bird’s method) without turning the micro dust on the floor into micro “concrete.”

I’ll further note that in reviewing my final finishing steps this go around (on the top side of the bird), that I just pulled the trigger on a longer 30″ sanding block and blue wet/dry 150 grit roll of sandpaper just a few days ago, with these delivered just yesterday.

So with new tools in hand, I got to work and wet sanded the right wing and winglet (I still need to do the rudder and aileron top).

I’ll also note while out today, I stopped by my NAPA Auto Parts store —where I bought my Nasson paint— and talked to both the in-house paint guru, and fortunately for me, the Nasson paint rep who just happened to be visiting.  My question was about the dozens of little shiny divots (not pinholes) just below the surface on the right wing that the epoxy had not quite filled in.  When, How and What to fill these was my overarching question at this point in the build.  I also had separate chats with both Mike Toomey and Steve Beert regarding this issue as well.  I have to say these 3 different guys could very likely be in a Barber Shop Quartet, because their respective answers were all in harmony and exactly the same: prime, fill the divots, final prime good before top coat.

So that dear readers is exactly my plan going forward.

It was again very late and I had run out of evening to do all the tasks I had planned to prep the left wing and winglet for epoxy wiping.  Again, I still need to final sand and contour the left winglet and fairing, but I also want to install some hard points for mounting a video camera mounting bracket on the top of the wing (and very top of winglet too, but not as critical for finishing IMO as wing).

In my research on using and mounting video cameras on airplanes, not surprisingly I discovered some companies that make aircraft video camera mounting brackets and components.  I loosely copied a diamond-shaped bracket from one of those companies as the style I would use for my wing-mounted video camera.  I then modeled that up in CAD and 3D printed the template.

The wing video camera mounting brackets will use a pair of 10-32 screws to secure the mount to the wing, much like the baggage pods on the inboard side.  The company that makes this bracket only makes a straight aluminum bracket, whereas I want mine to follow the curvature of the top wing: so composite it is (at least for now).

I first determined where the left wing cable conduit was situated inside the wing, and then positioned the vid cam mounting bracket mockup so that I would have one screw hard point forward of the conduit, and one aft.  I then traced the bracket template onto the wing.

I applied clear packing tape over the traced outline of the template and cut my glass.  The 5-ply layup schedule here is the oft-used BID-UNI-BID-UNI-BID.  I wet out a layer of peel ply first, laid up my glass, and then finished it off with peel ply on top.

Here is a better angle of the positioning of the video camera mounting bracket on the outboard wing (again, sorry for the weird LED-light induced patterns).

Tomorrow I’ll drill the 3/16″ holes in the cured bracket before removing it, then widen the holes in the wing before floxing in the 2 aluminum threaded hardpoints into the wing top (again, ala baggage pods) for this video camera mount… so those threaded inserts can be dialed in before I epoxy wipe the wing.  Then back on the winglet to get it finalized for epoxy wiping.

Pressing forward!

Today was a twofer.  Two strakes for the price of one!  Yep, I’d buy that for a dollar (Robocop!)

I finalized the right strake top contour by sanding down the added West 410 fill in the inboard aft corner.  As with many things on this build (and assume many other builds… ahem…), it’s not perfect, but it’s pretty darn close.  Unless someone reads this writeup or they have an insanely keen eye, they’ll never know that area contains about a 0.0217″ dip.
Shhhh, I won’t tell if you don’t!

I then got to work on the left strake, repeating virtually the same process as the right strake.  I used my aluminum “yardstick” to mark the low points, sand just those marked areas, rinse and repeat… and I do mean repeat: about 15 times.

Once I got the top contour of both strakes dialed in and the final sandings under my belt, with both a visual and multiple, multiple feel tests (I do at least a half dozen with my eyes closed to focus on the surface), I then exposed all the covered air pockets just as I did on the right wing.  For some reason these guys seemed to be quite a bit bigger on the strakes.  I’m wondering if that has anything to do with these being hollow as compared to the wings… hmmm, I don’t know.  But expose them I did.

There’s a restaurant in the area that has locals’ night every Wednesday that Jess and I have been trying to make it to for over a month now.  Well, I wanted to fill the gaping divots I just exposed in the strakes, so I whipped up some West 410 using the 205 fast hardener in the mix.  I then filled all the air pocket holes and divots before running out for a nice early dinner with Jess.

Upon my return to the shop, I sanded down my pothole fills, then vacuumed and used high pressure air to clean off both strake surfaces before taping up the perimeter in prep for epoxy wipes…

Which I did next.  All 5+ hours worth.

That being said, I’m really pleased with how these strake epoxy wipes came out.

My last task in yet another very late night/wee hours was to remove the protective border tape, to ensure it didn’t get affixed permanently to the bird!

Again, I’m super pleased with how the strakes turned out and the epoxy wipes seem to have good coverage, at least in my initial take.  For now, it’s super late and I’m hitting the rack!

So today was a transition day, with a lot of odd jobs and bits getting worked, and of course tons of sanding.

I started off by knocking down the epoxy wiped right wing, winglet, rudder and aileron top very carefully with 80 grit sandpaper.  Just enough to get it smooth and all the shiny areas dulled.  Tomorrow I plan to wet sand it with 150 grit sandpaper and a long board, as Cory Bird describes in his finishing how-to instructions.

I had done some fills on the left side, and one such task was filling in the edges of the left baggage pod’s top wing mounting screw holes, which had chipped a decent bit as I uncovered them.  I used a very thin amount of grease on some spare 10-32 SS screws and used them to keep the flocro out of the holes (pic 1), and as you can see it really worked a treat (pic 2).

I also employed another technique for micro finishing these birds that I found in a Central States Association (CSA) newsletter article.  It’s a rather simple method of finding the high spots on a wing or strake by using an aluminum “yardstick,” or any long piece of straight aluminum, to find the high spots.  You simply slide the edge back and forth on random intervals, using different axes and a pattern shows up where the high points —or ridges— are (pic 1).

I’ll do this a good 6-8 times, then mark up the surface (see below) and sand the entire surface 1-2 times before back to finding the high points.  I will note that after I got the surface as level as possible on the right strake, I still needed to backfill a small patch at the aft inboard area that was a bit too low compared the surrounding surface (pic 2).

I then got busy sanding the top of the left wing to finalize its contour in prep for the next step: epoxy wipes.  I started by marking up the entire top of the left wing using a pencil, the poor man’s guide coat if you will (pic 1).  I then spent a good couple of hours dialing in the surface of the top wing, and I’m happy to report that it is complete and ready for some epoxy wipes… although I still need to finalize the left winglet before that happens.

Tomorrow my goal is to get the right strake epoxy wiped, and finish sanding the left winglet so that the left wing and winglet can be epoxy wiped the following day (the goal anyway).  I need to fit in some sanding on the epoxy wiped surfaces of course too… yes, I’ve had to do some crazy juggling of tasks over the past couple of weeks to get all this micro finishing done before the cold weather comes rolling in… at some point.

But I’m still pressing forward!

Today was all about getting some West epoxy wipes down on the right wing and winglet.

But first, I made a fair bit of dust by sanding the right strake top a good bit.  After really getting a good bit of the micro finish knocked down I assessed the surface before applying some filler West 410/micro to the low spots.

Although I didn’t grab any shots, I also did another good round of sanding on the left wing, and am slowly dialing that in… although it still needs a bit of work to get all evened out.  The central wing area is good, but the outer wing and around the wing bolt area inboard are my stubborn problem areas.  The fix at this point is simple and standard in that more sanding should solve my elevation issues.

I also worked over the left winglet again, especially the upper outboard area.  Again, no pics on that.

I then got to work on the right wing and winglet prepping it for epoxy wipes.  At this point I wasn’t going to create any more dust on any other parts until the epoxy is fully cured on the right side (overnight).

To start, I needed to expose all the air pockets that were covered with just a very thin cover of micro.  I don’t want these showing up as blemishes in my finish later on.  I took about 30-45 minutes surveying my wing and winglet surface and simply exposed the air pockets (AKA “popping bubbles”) as I found them.  Here we have a representative before (pic 1) and after (pic 2) of how that looks.

And a whole area of popped micro pockets on my wing.  It’s not really a fun thing to do: making your wing surface look pockmarked and much worse.  But it’s definitely a good thing when all is said and done to expose these air pockets now and fill them with raw epoxy.

I taped off the perimeter of the wing at the leading and trailing edges, and also at the junction with the strake.  I then vacuumed all the surfaces and then went over them with high pressure air to remove any remaining dust.

I cut some 1x2s to create a quick hanging contraption for the right rudder, to allow me to epoxy wipe both sides of it.  I also prepped the right aileron to epoxy wipe just the top surface of that.

Fast forward 5+ hours later we have both sides of the right rudder and the top side of the right aileron epoxy wiped.

Another shot of the epoxy-wiped right rudder and aileron.

And here we have the right wing and winglet epoxy wiped.  Note that all the perimeter tape is pulled.

I’m calling it 4.5 coats since I had some epoxy left in my cup after 4 entire coats and all looked good except for some of the deeper holes and divots, so I simple dabbed a drop onto each one of those.

I only had maybe 6-8 little divot-fill dabs on both sides of the winglet, so I’m simply calling it 4 coats total for the epoxy wipes on the inboard (pic 1) and outboard (pic 2) sides of the winglet.

My epoxy wiping efforts on the right wing, winglet and accoutrements took me well into the wee hours of the mourning.  But, again, after the epoxy cures (as I sleep) I can once again make some dust on the other major components in prep for getting them epoxy wiped as well (whichever one comes out with the best surface contour first!).

Pressing ahead…

I started off today by sanding down the micro/West 410 added fills to various areas on the left side, the first being the left wingtip, which was a bit “droopy” on the outboard edge.

I also added some micro/West 410 to the left wing’s BL 55.5 dip, where there is an elevation change on the wing.  Some builders sand this to natural contour, while others tend to hide it and have it filled more.  Since I’m very sneaky (ha!) I decided to hide it a bit more and make the top of the wing look a little more even here (pic 1).  Not to waste any leftover micro/West 410, I also filled in a few distinct low spots and any major divots I could find on the wing/winglet surfaces (pic 2).

Again, today with the added fill cured, I sanded all those down a good bit.

I’ll note that when I specify micro and “West 410,” the emphasis for these added fills is on the West 410.  What I’m doing here is essentially cheating by upping the ratio of West 410, which makes the added fill easier to sand without digging into or deforming the previous micro fill.

That being said, I also had enough left over to fill low spots and divots on the left strake as well, which I then sanded smooth today.

As I mentioned in yesterday’s blog post, a goal of mine today was to work all the wing and strake leading edges to get the bottom edge of each smooth/erased, and also the actual shape of the leading edges dialed in to final for the upcoming epoxy wipes.  Well, I’m happy to report that I accomplished this goal… sorry, no pics because it wouldn’t really show any real difference than before.

However, a distinct BEFORE and AFTER difference is the pre-shaping of the left strake leading edge oil heat/fresh air RAM intake scoop (pic 1), and the AFTER shot of that, now ready for epoxy wipes (pic 2).

Jess had the night off so it was date night, and I wanted to get out of the shop mid-evening.  I was working to get the right strake micro completely sanded when I got a call from my local Long-EZ buddy, Guy Williams.  He found a potential problem with his right gear and wanted my help in troubleshooting it.

So after a bit on the phone with Guy, I got back to the right strake sanding.  But alas, I didn’t have enough time to finish it so I’ll have to pick up on it tomorrow.  I’d say currently we’re at about 90% complete on the right strake (that’s not including cowl shoulder or longeron micro), so getting close to epoxy wiping!

In working on the right strake, as I did on the left side, I cleaned up the intersection of the strake where it meets the fuselage side.  Moreover, part of that was also working the right strake root fresh air intake port.  I’ll probably do just a bit more fine-tuning in this area, but it too is very close to final.

Finally, part of my strake sanding shenanigans this evening involved recutting and cleaning up the junction gap between right strake and wing.  I need to add a bit more flocro to both the wing edge and the strake edge where some chunks have broken off, but beyond that, this junction is pretty much final.

Tomorrow I’ll continue to press forward… And hopefully get to some epoxy wiping!

Last night I added a bit of micro/West 410 to the front and top inboard edge of the right rudder, and today I started off by knocking that down a bit before remounting the rudder. I then spent about 45 min. sanding the front edge of the rudder on both inboard (pic 1) and outboard (pic 2) sides to match the surface level of the winglet at the intersection between the two.  I may need some very minor tweaking after my final checks, but for the most part the right rudder is done.

With the leftover micro/West 410 in the cup from my inboard rudder added fill (and outboard right aileron edge too), I had filled a few key low spots on the wing as well as a bunch of egregious divots.  I spent about 15 minutes with a sanding block knocking all those back to level.

I then dove in on the right aileron, doing pretty much the same with it as I did the right rudder: matching the front and side edges surface level to that of the intersecting wing.

Again, I added some micro/West 410 to the outboard front and side edge, about 8-10″ of the top aileron, and then knocked off the rough stuff before re-installing the aileron.  Besides the outboard area that I added micro to, the remaining front edge of the aileron actually needed sanded down to match the wing surface level, so I taped the edge of the wing and hit the aileron’s front edge first with the orbital sander, then with a straight board (pic 1).  I then sanded down the added micro on the outboard side and leveled that with the surrounding wing surface (pic 2).  Also note the sanded down clickbond install that was also micro filled last night as well.

Here we have the matching surface levels of right aileron to wing, going clockwise from the top left pic, I started inboard near the first hinge and then moved outboard approximately a foot each position.  Not bad…

Although I need to work on the right strake, I chose to focus the rest of my time this evening on the left side since I had gotten the front half of the wing fairly dialed in with a nice smooth contour, but the aft side wasn’t cooperating as much.  The left wing seems to be requiring a bit more attention than the right wing.

After a few rounds of sanding mainly with the air file and 30″ boat board, I made a lot of progress, and tomorrow I’ll start back in with the long board.

I hit the left strake with a couple good rounds of sanding, doing the 45° sanding strokes once to the left, then once towards the right (standard op for all my flight surfaces).

I then spent about 20 minutes just focused on the left strake to wing intersection, mainly at the leading edge.  It still needs some final dialing in, but it’s pretty darn close at this point.

I grabbed these shots for both left (pardon the weird LED light patterns) and right sides.  The right wing is VERY close to being ready for epoxy wipes, while the left wing still needs a bit of work… I’d call it 70% finished at this point.  I also need to work both strakes as well, especially the inboard aft sides of those and their intersections with the top cowling front lip.

I didn’t grab a shot of it, but I whipped a small batch of micro/West 410 and did some filling on the left side, with my main targets being the BL 55.5 dip on the left wing (too low), as well as the wingtip just in front of the winglet leading edge (edge was low compared to wing).  Then, as I did on the right side, I used the remainder in my cup to fill a number of distinctly low spots and divots on both the left wing and strake.

Tomorrow I’ll continue to press forward on both right and left wings, winglets, and strakes.  One specific task I plan on completing on all surfaces is the blending of the bottom leading edge micro with the previous bottom filled surfaces.  I also plan on getting the left winglet squared away, to allow me to install the rudder and get it dialed in.

Pressing forward… slow, but persistent!

And rights of passage…

Any canard builder can tell you that yet another of many, I guess the grand finale, right of passage in building these birds is the micro-finishing process.

I started off this multi-day process with hitting the left wing and strake tops again with the air file.

This knocked down the micro a good bit more, but still a long way to go on the left side.

Here’s a selfie towards the end of the evening to capture just how amazingly messy this whole micro-finishing affair is all the way around.

I cut to length and ripped on the table saw a pre-primed board to create a stick of pain that is nearly 67″ long, which allows me to attach 4 each ~3″ wide peel-n-stick 36 grit sandpaper strips onto it, end-to-end.  To secure the board’s straightness, and give me a handle to grip, I screwed a 2×2 down the top (which I ripped on one side to ensure it too was straight).

Let the real pain begin!

As a level marker/guide coat I decided to use pencil vs spray paint, mainly because all the paint I have on hand has too long of cure times.  And I forgot to pick up some guide coat paint at the store.

No worries.  I grabbed my carpenter’s pencil and simply went to town on the right wing and strake tops (pic 1).  I then grabbed my stick o’ pain and started work from the leading edge aft on the right wing (pic 2).  I was a bit surprised at how many low spots I had, but that is the entire reason for using a guide coat in the first place, eh?

After a number of rounds of using the long sanding block, and then the 30″ boat-sanding block (with 4.5″ wide 3M Stikit 36 grit paper), I stopped when the wing’s micro surface was close to final level… I’d say over 90% final.

I then installed the aileron on the wing and the rudder on the winglet.

I spent the rest of the evening and most of today working to fine-tune and dial-in the intersecting seams of the aileron to wing and rudder to winglet.

Part of the effort on finalizing the right aileron finishing and install was mounting a clickbond in the middle of outboard hinge, in between the 2 existing screws.  I 3D printed a sanding block and prepped the clickbond for bonding.

Here’s a shot of the clickbond floxed in place and secured with a ply of BID and a ply of UNI (after cure).

I shot a video detailing what exactly I’m up to with adding this clickbond to the right aileron’s outboard hinge.  It also includes a project update at the current state of the build.

Tomorrow I’ll continue to press forward with sanding the micro-finish on the wings, strakes and winglets in my quest to get them finished and ready for paint.

Again, my current status is that I have both wings, both winglets, both strakes, both rudders, and both ailerons now in micro [caveat: underside outboard few feet of wing and inside lower winglets currently not micro’d].

My next task that I didn’t grab a shot of was prepping and microing the top surface of the left aileron.

As you might have guessed, I’m trying to keep the micro cure times somewhat matched for the control surfaces: inboard rudder to inboard winglet; top of aileron to top of wing, etc. to match sand those surfaces here shortly.

I bought some 40 grit sanding disks for my orbital sander and did a full regime of that on the right wing and strake tops.  I also hit both sides of the right winglet, the winglet-to-wing fairing and around the wingtip area at the Nav/Strobe light bump.

I then did a few more rounds on the right side with my air file, which really got the micro knocked down to much closer to final contour… I’d say about 80% done.  Tomorrow I’ll probably do one final round with the air file before switching to hand sanding with what my buddy Dave B. calls “the sticks of pain,” AKA sanding boards.

As with so many things on this build, the micro-finishing work is an iterative process. It’s certainly a workout, and can be monotonous and repetitive, but it really is a cool process to see the imperfect surfaces get so smoothed out.  I have to say I’m really pleased so far as to how it’s all shaping up.

Here we have the right wing tip Nav/Strobe base, also at about 80% to final.

I then got to work on the left side, mainly just get the high spots knocked down and the micro to general shape.  I hit the entire micro’d surfaces of the left wing and strake, and also leading edge on both of those as well.  I still have quite a bit to go on the left side, but it was a good start.

I’m at the point on the right side where I’ll be breaking out my pencil (or black paint) to ensure my surface level is even across the board as I finalize my micro application.

Moving forward.

This blog post covers the past two days, since I’m just now getting to posting it.

First off, since I was up pretty darn late microing up the left strake top and leading edge, it was mid-afternoon when I got around to cheese grating the surface to knock down the high spots.  This took nearly 2 hours.

I then needed to run out and knock out a few errands, and upon my return mid-evening I spent another good 2 hours prepping the left wing and inboard winglet for micro.

I taped up the wing-strake seam gap and also mounted the top cowling, with its interfacing edge taped up.  And I finally remembered to get a shot of the extended/ relocated strake flange edge over to the wing… eliminating an air gap along the front outboard edge of the top strake.  You can see the difference from before (pic 1) and after (pic 2).

Here’s a shot of the cleaned and prepped left wing top and inboard left winglet, ready for micro.

Today I got busy with my left wing/inboard winglet micro task by first apply flocro around the wing-strake seam edge, as I have on all my other micro finishing jobs.

And again, over 4 hours later here we have the left wing top, leading edge and inboard winglet surfaces micro’d.

Another shot of the left wing top micro’d up.

And one final shot of left wing top and inboard winglet micro’d.

Tomorrow I plan on applying micro to the top of the left aileron and cheese grating the micro I just applied on the left wing tonight.  In addition, I plan to start sanding the right wing, inboard winglet and strake.