I did a bunch of minor work on the subpanel. I straightened the flange so it’s in line with the firewall. That helped with positioning the support ribs, which I drilled to the subpanel. I also drilled the seal support to the center subpanel.
Didn’t get much done on the project over the weekend. I had to go into work for a little while, and had some other projects going on.
I did drill the hat section to the subpanel along with the middle rib. I also trimmed the short support ribs.
Worked more on the subpanel seal supports and trimmed the hat section that goes on the back of the subpanel. I think the hat section covers some of the canopy release mechanism.
Worked on fabricating the little supports for the subpanel seal.
Finished the top skin dimpling with the C-frame and clecoed the skins back on to the fuselage. I’m not going to rivet them for a while. I still need to do some wiring in the aft fuselage. That task will be much easier with the skins off.
I also worked a little more on the panel angle fabrication.
I did some deburring and dimpling on the aft top skin. I also did a little bit of shaping on some of the panel angles.
Last night was Adele’s piano recital, and I thought I wouldn’t get much done on the project tonight either. However, Adele’s swim meet was cancelled at the last minute due to thunderstorms. I was able to do a bunch of deburring and dimpling on the top skins. After I had enough of that, I started to look at what else needs to be finished up on the fuselage.
I was going to fabricate the push rod for the control columns, but it’s already made. Yeah! I just cleaned it up for priming once the weather improves.
I also looked at the plans for the area behind the panel. I cut a few parts to length that need to be fabricated.
I’m hoping to get the rest of the fuselage kit wrapped up by July 1.
In addition to some fun Father’s Day stuff (walking in the park, swimming, playing croquet), I spent a few hours deburring and countersinking the last few parts on the cabin frame. I just need to paint the parts and then rivet the support to the cabin frame and F-706 bulkhead. I might leave some of that riveting for later so that I can remove the cabin frame for better wiring access.
As I mentioned before, the blind countersunk rivets have a slightly larger head than the solid rivets. I didn’t countersink deep enough for that, so the heads were sticking up a tiny bit. I used the Scotch-brite wheel and some sand paper to take care of that minor problem.
I also did some dimpling and riveting at the top of the F-706 bulkhead. The plans have you leave out some rivets at the top of the bulkhead. However, with the new cabin frame attachment those rivets can be set.
I spent a little time today finishing up the cabin frame. I drilled the inside bracket holes, which ended up being rather difficult. I drilled #40 pilot holes in the brackets according to the dimensions on the plans. I then mounted the cabin frame, installed temporary bolts, and then used a drill bit to mark the hole locations on the frame through the bracket. Ideally, I would have just drilled the holes while the frame was attached, but there wasn’t nearly enough room to fit the angle drill through the access hole in the back of the frame. I disassembled everything and drilled the frame to #40 on the bench. I re-assembled the frame once again and then drilled the holes from the outside to #12 in steps. I also drilled the forward row of holes at the aft end of the cabin frame support.
I have a little bit of deburring, countersinking, and priming still to do, but the cabin frame is basically done at this point.
I rented a 172 and flew down to the Home Wing Fly-in down in Scappoose, Oregon. It was fairly cloudy and bumpy all the way down and back, but otherwise a nice flight. We would have gotten nice views of Mt. Rainier and Mt. St. Helens if it had been clear. Oh well.
Julie and Adele flew with me, although I think they were quickly bored of looking at RVs.
Adele took a ton of pictures from the back seat. Here’s just a couple.
This is a picture of an RV squandron that did some formation flying overhead. They’re difficult to see, but they’re landing one after another in this shot.
This RV had a cool paint job. Kind of like an old Corvette.
