Saturday 2
My friend Marty called in, I think he just stopped by to say hi but he was soon lending me a hand on the Europa. It was great to have a second pair of hands because I needed to fit the top fuselage molding in place so I could locate the stern post. It took a little reshaping of the rear bulkhead and the mass balance assembly in order to get it to sit down properly. It was then I discovered that I really had made a mistake by not fitting up the top molding with cleco's when I was bonding on the lift pins. The top molding definitely moved the front lift pins a tiny bit, so I will have to redo them at a later time.
We made up ply bits for the tail wheel mount and I needed 5 to get the tail wheel to sit at the right spot. This meant I would need about 13 layers of cloth. I cut up enough cloth and got the resin out to warm up. After dinner I persuaded my wife to come help with the lay-up and we had all 13 bits of cloth laid in nicely in about 2.5 hours.
Sunday 3
I made up my own steel plate out of 50 mm wide flat bar for the tail wheel spring tang to mount onto. The manual mentions that the flat tang will probably not be at right angles to the spring and sure enough mine wasn't. I didn't really fancy propping this all up in the (hopefully) right spot to be Reduxed in place. I used the same idea I had for accurately locating the flap hinge mounting bracket, where I put a self tapping screw in each corner so I could accurately set the angle and height of the plate before putting the Redux on. I was able set it up easily and then bond it in place.
Monday 4
Well I discovered that the tail wheel mount was in the wrong place. I had carefully measured the distance from the rear of the fuselage instead of the front face of the stern post. I called up Andy at Europa and asked him if he thought it would be a problem. "Well, depends" was the reply. I lamented to Andy on what a really nice lay up it was, to which he replied with typical English wit, "its better for it to be vaguely right than precisely wrong". At this stage I am not sure what I will do, other than think about it.
Tuesday 5 ~ Friday 15
I sort of took a bit of a break from the project. I was really irritated at spending so much time in carefully installing the tail wheel mounting point, in the wrong place. It really seemed like an daunting task to have to remove all that glass and epoxy resin, so I got out a really good book and read it instead. It wasn't about flying either!
Saturday 16
My friend Marty called in to see how my project was progressing and to generally take a look. I showed him my latest "Aw shit" but he seemed to think it wasn't really much of a big deal. He told me that once he had to remove about 50 layers of glass and proceeded to show me how it was done. We got a small sharp chisel and with a bit of care and patience it was possible to remove a couple of layers at a time. After about 3 hours of work we had it nearly back to where it was. At that be bid me farewell, and I proceeded to cut some more ply and cloth for a new mount.
Sunday 17
Well this was pretty well a repeat of the last
time. I didn't seem to do it any quicker or better either. I assume
that means that I am now as "expert" as I will ever be at glass work ? The
job turned out pretty nicely with no obvious air bubbles.
Monday 18
I made up another steel plate and Reduxed it in place using the same method as before. I still needed to make up an access hole and an inspection port on the top fuselage half. I made up a couple of 4 ply splash molds on some cling wrap for the covers.
To do this I put some double sided tape on the fuselage and then stretched cling wrap tightly over the spot where I wanted to take the mold. I then wet out four ply's of cloth and squeegee'd it onto the cling wrap. The last step is to cover it with some peel ply and let it dry.
Once it has all dried it is clear enough for me to see through and find the center of the hole I have drawn on the fuselage, I then drill a tiny hole in the splash mold so I can pick up the center. The other thing I do is to put a scribe line on the splash mold all the way over to the fuselage so I can realign it once I have cut out the circle. I have tried using a sharpened pair of dividers to cut the circle without much success and I have ended up cutting them out with a coping saw.
Tuesday 19
One of the things I work on when I am tired of
epoxy and glass is the instrument panel. Bob Jacobson http://www.galaxyhobby.com/panel.htm
actually went to the
trouble of building a whole new instrument panel which I thought was a bit
radical, but now that I have got into it I think he had the right idea.
The Europa panel is not quite deep enough, or wide enough. I have found
trying to get a layout that works for IFR pretty tricky and I have already had
to do quite a bit of rework of the panel.
Today I cut out the aluminum blank I had made for the right hand side of the panel. I have been fortunate enough to borrow an instrument hole punch so I cut the hole for the clock and the 2.25" CDI that goes with my GX60 approach certified GPS/Comm. unit. For engine monitoring I have decided to go with the EIS system, and I also purchased the manifold vacuum and outside air temperature option for it. This unit is very compact and although it is not as elegant as some products on the market its price is very competitive.
The last job I did on the panel was to make a chassis to hold the standard 6.25" mounting for the GX60, and other avionics I might want to add in the future. This ended up taking much longer than I thought, but it turned out fairly well. Because of the design of the Europa panel it is pretty limiting on the depth and height of the avionics stack that I can add. The GX60 is only just going to fit, and as I get lower in the panel it becomes even more limiting.
My friend Marty came by for a chat so while he was about I got him to give me a hand to drill the hole for the tail wheel spring. It's amazing the difference another pair of hands can make.
Wednesday 20
I decided to do the next step for the access and inspection ports that go in
the top of the fuselage. I finished shaping the hole and the cover to be a
nice fit and then covered the back of them with cling wrap using double sided
tape. I then taped them into place with duct tape. A lay-up of 4
ply's of bid is required to make up a flange to go inside the fuselage. I
cut the cloth to be a circle and make each one slightly smaller than the
next. Once I have this wetted out on cling wrap I put it on the inside of
the fuselage and cover it with peel ply.
While that lot was drying I made up the small block that secures the starboard wing pin and put some bid on the top of it. I think I will cover the whole thing in a multi step operation rather than try and get the bid to cover the tight bends and edges.
Thursday 21
I tackled a number of small jobs today. I am not suffering the 90 % done 90% to go syndrome yet, but I am getting a taste of what its like to have to do all those small jobs. I decided not to use the self adhesive cable ties but to bond some in with Redux. I did the section along the port fuselage which will have the wiring for the position light, the MAX servo and the antenna's. I will probably put a run along the starboard side if I decide to go with a single tail strobe with the power supply under the baggage bay. This will keep the high voltage cable away from the rest of the aircraft wiring.
Since I was in a "thinking about wiring" frame of mind I soldered up the MAC servo cable. Doing this is a rude reminder that I am becoming short sighted !!. After I had completed this I saw a neat idea on the Aeroelectric web site. http://www.aeroelectric.com where he had made up a small plug instead of just soldering the cable to it.
I had ordered some Nylon tube from AC Spruce and that arrived
today. I have decided to sheath the rudder cables in tubing to remove all
possibility of them rubbing on things that they shouldn't. After cutting
off the thimbles (!@*!!) I did the front section to about 50 mm short of the
engine frame and the rudder pulley's. This seems a much nicer idea for
keeping these things out of harms way. I intend to clip them to the side
of the tunnel so they can't get tangled up with the min wheel. The only
down side to this is that I am still not happy with the fuel hoses.
Although they can't rub because the rudder cable is now covered I am still going
to move them a bit. This means another hole in the cockpit
module.
In retrospect I now sincerely regret not modifying the fuel system so that I could manufacture the thing out of standard aircraft fuel fittings. What I should have done is to have two new tank outlets made that had holes tapped in them that I could screw standard fittings into. This would have then allowed me to make up all aluminum fuel lines. They would never require replacement (I hope), shouldn't leak and would be far less bulky.
The last job for the day was to finish off the inspection port cover plates. They turned out really nicely, but do represent quite an investment in time.
Friday 22
I glassed up the two holes in the cockpit module where I had refitted the fuel hoses. I added a couple of layers of cloth as well. I am sure that this won't be the end of the "fuel system" saga. I am giving serious consideration to removing the two filters under the seat and going with a single Gascolator.
While all that sticky stuff was setting I cut out the right hand side of the instrument panel. I had to make a small rebate in the left hand side to accommodate the flange for the avionics chassis, so this really represented quite a bit of fiddling around.
Saturday 23
Well I fitted up the fuel hoses again and got it right, hopefully that's the last time for a while that I have to pull those darn things off and on. The good news is that with all of the access holes its not particularly difficult.
I did a bit more on the instrument panel and put a couple of layers of cloth on the rebate area to give its some more strength.
Sunday 24
I decided to sheath up the rear section of rudder cables with nylon tubing as well. This is a really nice arrangement because it removes all possibility of the cables rubbing on the fuel hoses in the tunnel. I will secure the tubing with cable clips once I get the luggage bay in place.
I
put Graham Singletons tail wheel mod assembly in place with cleco's and ran some
string lines to the wheel to get an idea where the cables are going to exit the stern
post. Actually this is going to be much neater than how Europa does it.
The last job for the day was to make a couple of tufnol blocks and mount them by the engine frame to stop the rudder cables from rubbing.
Monday 25
Today was one of those days that was a really good idea to take off with the family. Ho ho. I think I'd make a really good scrooge, fancy cutting into a building day !!.
Tuesday 26
I did a little more on the instrument panel for a while. Its amazing how much time you end up investing in these things. I then turned my attention to the fuselage. Since I was happy with the position of the tail wheel mod bracket I drilled the correct size holes and bolted it up. It will have to come out one more time at least because it needs a coat of paint.
I went out to my freezing cold garage to find my luggage bay assembly, and boy that was a quick trip. Its about 10 degrees F out there. Its so cold even the locals are whining about it ! Anyhow, after it and myself had warmed up again I did the cut outs for the inspection cover plates and the half moon shaped cover. My son Justin was on a bit of a loose end, so between us we managed to get the cut outs done, fit up the nut plates, make a couple of cover plates and cover them with epoxy and cloth. While the sticky stuff was setting I started to fit the thing into the fuselage
Wednesday 27
The sun was shining so I left work a bit early and went flying. Well the sun might have been shining but it was a trick because not a spot of heat seemed to be coming out of it. I did a couple of practice instrument approaches and started to learn how to do chandelles. I have been meaning to do my commercial pilots rating and I have to learn how to do lazy eights and chandelles. We soon lost interest though because is was so darn cold!!
Thursday 28
I ordered a Gascolator today. I have decided to mount it in the luggage bay and do away with the two filters under the seats.
Friday 29
I trimmed
off the excess cloth on the baggage bay cover plates and the ribs. I had
applied peel ply to the side that will be visible and it had turned out with a
nice finish.
I then turned my attention to where the baggage bay as going to fit. I used my 50mm drum sander to scuff sand all of the surfaces where I was going to apply either Redux or fiberglass cloth. I took a slightly different approach to fitting the ribs. I set the baggage bay on my bench and hot glued the ribs in place. I then did a trial fit of the baggage bay. This worked out pretty well because I could pull them off and on with out a lot of trouble, so after about 3 tries I had them fitted up pretty well. I then bonded them in place with 5 minute epoxy and once it had set I put on two layers of cloth on each side of each rib.
Saturday 30
I consumed most of the day fooling around with the instrument panel. I pretty well got all of the rivnuts I needed to secure the right hand side fitted into place. Once I had them riveted I set the instrument panel in place with the screws. I could only get one pop rivet into some of the rivnuts, so I put some Redux on those to make sure they couldn't move.
I have been surprised at the amount of time that I have spent on the mechanical work on the panel. I have quite an investment in time and I am now being very careful every time I have to drill or cut it, it would be a shame to have to start over.