Dave’s RV-7A Building Log

Apparently it didn’t make the national news, but Seattle was hit by a huge windstorm Thursday night. I worked on the plane a little bit that night as the lights flickered on and off. We finally lost power altogether around 11pm and still don’t have it restored. With a generator, we’re able to keep our fridge, natural gas furnace, satellite receiver/TV, and a few lights working. Each day, I’ve managed to string some extension cords into the garage for lights and get a few things done on the plane. It’s so darn close that I can’t let a little thing like lack of power get in my way.

A shipment from Spruce arrived Thursday, so I was able to finish up several items including putting some thinned RTV on the ends of the firesleeve, clamping the cabin heat hoses, securing the sniffle valve tube, and installing a heat shield for the throttle cable. Friday I messed around with the alternate air cable, attaching it to the little screw on the door and adle clamping it to the oil return tube on cylinder #2.

Saturday I messed around with the forward center floor cover. I tried using the soundproofing foam to protect the brake and fuel lines and wires in that area. I split each wire bundle into two so they weren’t so thick. Even with that, the 1/2″ foam is just too thick in that area. I’ll order some 1/4″ foam, which should work quite well.

Sunday I did a bunch of adle clamping on the right side of the engine, securing the starter and alternator wires and other stuff. I just need to secure the cabin heat SCAT hose, and that should be wrapped up.

I didn’t get nearly as much done as I wanted, but did make forward progress despite the lack of power.

I finished cutting out the soundproofing material for the firewall, a very time consuming task. I had to make little cutouts for all the control cables, parking brake valve, etc. that are attached to the firewall. Before attaching it, I decided to take care of a few things. I added a nut plate to the firewall for securing the battery cable, and two nut plates to the firewall recess for securing the wiring bundles running down the aft side of the firewall.

I put a bright light inside the fuselage and turned out the lights in the garage to find any remaining leaks in the firewall. Sure enough there were a couple more spots that I needed to apply some RTV.

I started cutting out the “Super Soundproofing” material for the firewall and sticking it on with 3M Super 77. Before doing that, I did a little heat/flame test on the material. It was very resistant to the heat gun and didn’t burn on it’s own. According to the Spruce catalog, it meets the FAA standards for flame resistance. Good enough for me. I think I’ll also use the material under the center floor cover to cushion the fuel and brake tubes and wiring. My only concern with the material is that it’s not very durable. Kicking it will chew it up. If that ends up being a problem, I’ll cover it with some kind of interior material.

I’ve been debating about how to protect the wires that I can’t adequately secure, e.g. inside the canopy deck. I finally settled on using some vinyl tubing from Lowes. I used it on the wires for the cockpit/panel flood lights in the F-704 covers and the co-pilot push-to-talk button that I installed in the forward canopy deck.

That ended up being the last wiring tasks in the panel area. Time to start securing things. I used cable ties and bundled all the wires together, collecting up the slack and extra wires. It took quite a while to get it all looking good and secure. I worked my way down the firewall and back along the forward part of the floor.

I picked up a Pentel white pen yesterday and had Julie touch up a couple of spots on the labels. It worked really well. I also cleaned off the remainder of the extra spray glue with a soft cloth and rubbing alcohol. I’ve very pleased with how the labels turned out. Not sure if they were worth all the hassle, but they look great now.

The next obvious task was to re-install the panel. I used the black cap screws that Carl and I bought a while back from McMaster-Carr. With the panel in place, I was able to connect up the trim wires to the AFS harness. When I first hooked up the power outlet, I didn’t connect a ground figuring the panel was well grounded. Well, now it’s powder coated and I don’t want to chip off the finish if I don’t have to. I soldered a dedicated ground wire to it. I also installed a better audio plug that’s not grounded to the panel. I used some granny glasses that Adele bought for her Halloween costume. They sure work great for close-up detail work, but I’m not sure they’re worth the gibing from the peanut gallery.

And here’s the panel in day and night mode with everything but the glass screens (still waiting for AFS), the GPS (waiting for Gamin), and the cabin heat, alternate air, and parking brake cables installed (waiting to install firewall blanket).

Two more smaller rounds of labels, and I’m now declaring them done! There are a couple of areas that need some touch-up, but I’ll figure that out later. They turned out really quite good. The pictures have some glue remanents still, but I need to wait a day for the labels to set up before removing it with some rubbing alcohol.

To knock something off the list, I also finally re-installed the nut plates on the F-704 forward flange that I removed a year ago (?!) to install the gear mounts.

Now that the panel is ready to go back in, I made up an aggressive task list for this weekend. I warned Julie that I’ll be obsessed with the plane over the next few days. We’ll see how much gets done.

Tonight’s round of labels went pretty well. Unfortunately, I ended up peeling off some of the labels that were already down, but I have a way to prevent that in the future. Hopefully just one more labeling round, and I’ll have them finished. They’ll definitely be done by this weekend, and I’ll be able to finally re-install the panel.

I tinkered around a bit, figuring out how to route the wires for the co-pilot push-to-talk button. I’m going to mount it on the forward canopy deck. Since the co-pilot stick is removable, it’s too much hassle to mount it in the stick. I also made labels for all of the extra wires in the avionics harness. I had Stark add some wires that I’ll eventually hook up to a 396/496/596 GPS and maybe an ADS-B unit in the future. He just put scotch tape labels on the wires, so I made more permanent labels and covered the ends of each wire with small black heat shrink.

I organized my remaining task list a bit. I need to really concentrate on getting some stuff knocked off over the next few weeks. I’m hoping to get the plane moved down to the hangar at the end of this month, which means spending less time tinkering and more time getting stuff done.

I also booked some time with Mike Seager in January. Hopefully the weather is decent then for transition training.

I tried another round of labels, hoping it would be close to the last one. None of the labels turned out. I took a break in the middle for dinner, and I think that was not a good idea. The letters floated right off the mylar in the water bath. Oh well. Tomorrow will be better.

I took care of another unpleasant task earlier today and paid use tax on the plane. I’m glad that’s behind me.

I had another hour of time left in the evening. I secured the breather tube to the lower engine mount with adle clamps. I originally followed the Vans recommendation for securing the fuel overflow tube, but it was in the way of the breather tube clamp. I moved it and secured it with adle clamps as well. Looks much better. I just need one bolt for the fuel flow sensor and the left side of the engine will be completely done.

Finally had some success with the labels. I think I just haven’t been using enough of the spray glue. I laid it on really thick this time, and had most of the switch labels stick really well. I couple of words were sketchy, so I’ll make up new transfers with just those words on them. It was a huge relief to get them working finally. Maybe I’ll get it finished in one or two more sessions (fingers crossed), and I can finally get the panel re-installed.

I spent a little more time on the plane tinkering with various things. I installed a couple of heat shield and started to look at securing the starter and alternator wires. I also removed the crankcase breather tube and shortened it a little more. Trying to get the firewall forward wrapped up.

Spent the weekend in Spokane. It was good to have a break from my maniacle building pace lately. Ironically, I was still building over the weekend. I was helping my friend Jeff with his 7A, putting on the engine mount and drilling the gear mounts.

I had a little time this afternoon for the plane. My order from Spruce arrived Friday with two 45 degree fittings for the fuel flow sensor. Ideally, the sensor would be in the middle of a straight run, but I cannot make it work. I don’t think the 45’s will affect the reading at all, but we’ll see. The fit is really good, and the fuel line is a good distance from the exhaust pipes. I made a little bracket to hold the sensor secure to the engine mount. I also adle clamped the fuel line to one of the intake pipes. I hate adle clamps. Hopefully there’s not too many more in my future.