Thursday April 11, 2024
Wheel Pant Sanding/Reinforcement, Firewall to Cowling Attach
(2.5 Hours Firewall Forward, 0.8 Hours Landing Gear)
3.2 Hours Total

I spent a while today sanding the mating point between the forward and aft halves of the wheel pants.

Here's a picture to prove it was me!

Then I added 3 layers of fiberglass reinforcement to the inboard attachment points per the plans.

Then I removed the engine mount and landing gear from the firewall to make space to install the hinges and attachment brackets for the cowling. This will be much easier to do without the mount in the way.

The newer plans include an alternative way of mounting the bottom of the cowl to the firewall. They have you install these FF-00098 brackets and then use screws/nutplates. Apparently this lasts longer than the hinges. Unfortunately, my fuselage kit was old and didn't include these newer parts, so I made them myself out of 0.063" alclad.

They get riveted to the firewall and bottom fuselage skin here and provide attachment points for the bottom half of the cowl.

I also made 0.020" spacers and a template to use when drilling the holes through the cowl.

I still need to countersink the FF-00098s and rivet them to the fuselage.

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