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Comment for Bryan Cotton......

An observation that warms the heart...........you working on your project with your boys. I think most of us have kids of various ages and I imagine most of us (like me) could never get our kids to participate in the building of an airplane. We can't seem to "pry them away" from their smart phones long enough to do much of anything.........much less come into the work shop and pick up a tool and use it.

I envy you and commend you on your journey though your project........what a great "bonding experience" for you guys.

Gordon........Onex......Hummel 2400

Bryan Cotton wrote:Well, we have joined the cracked canopy club. Got one of these on each side.

Sorry about the crack, but I must applaud your forward-thinking to pre-drill a stop-hole for the crack!

You won't even see the crack once the rails and straps are installed.

Thanks Gordon! You may like our Saturn rebuild blog too:
http://www.saturnfans.com/forums/showth ... p?t=230898
We have 3000 miles on it now. Ryan, you are right, can't see that crack.

Our canopy frame is all painted, so time to put the hook back on and install the spring.


Here Adam is pulling aluminum rivets:


And here the canopy is substantially done. Still have some minor fit issues to work, but we are moving onto the cowl.

Adam had MLK day off so he made the prop spacer. Rather than make the complicated shape on the plans, we glued a luann plywood spacer onto the thick spacer.


We made a simple compass to mark the cutout. You can see on the other side I filed a little divot to mark the center.


Time to cut it out.


Here the prop spacer is bolted in place.


The cowl sticks up pretty good in the back. We did make a slot for the gear and it looks like we need to trim the oil cooler.


Another view.


I'll be perusing some of your builder websites. Any words of wisdom are welcome!

Bryan, page 12 on my photo album. Holding the factory aft edge of the cowl firmly against the firewall, I drew a reference line on the cowl, 2 inches forward from the firewall. That way I could keep track of how much I was removing.

The cowl instructions show the bottom of the cowl blending into the fuselage. Before removing material, the cowl is way below the fuselage side. After cutting the material off the cowl, the fuselage and cowl blend nicely at the bottom. I forget exactly, but my first cut was about 1/2", I think? Every time I took some off the side, the top came down so that it was closer to the windshield line.

When I took material off, it was a consistent amount from the bottom to the top longeron. From the top longeron to the gas cap, it was tapered. Let me say that a another way. Let's say I took off 1" from the cowl side...the cowl top amount, to be removed, was 1" starting at the side corner (where the windshield starts) tapering down to 1/2" at the gas cap. The point is...I removed less material along the top than the side. You have to be sure to maintain the distance from the prop spacer to the center of the windshield.

After I was done, the cowl top still sprung up about 1/2". I didn't remove anymore material, being afraid some other dimension would be too "far out". As it ended up, the carb air filter and cowl were rubbing and had to be modified...but that's another story.

I can't remember when, but at one point I had to remove material off the aft bottom cowl or call it the trailing edge, maybe 1/4 to 1/2" because there is a slight up turn in the fiberglass at that point. By removing that material, the cowl was able to move up slightly.

If this is not descriptive enough, PM or call me.

Too much overtime lately for a big project at work. Finally back at it. A significant milestone:

That is the cardboard from the monster canopy box cut up for the recycle bin.

I'd like to thank you guys who posted your trials on your cowl. I had faith, I kept trimming, and we are getting there.


Initially I took off 1/2" all around. Then it looked like I needed a taper cut, more at the bottom than the seam. Did that a couple times, also cutting the bottom back as well. The side fits well, the top is not springing up like crazy, but it seems I cut too much off the top.


So, do I keep trimming the side and bottom, or glue more on the top? Final picture is from underneath. Needs a diagonal trim.

Bryan, if you draw a center line from the hub to the tail, is the top edge of the cowl parallel to that centerline? I think the instructions say that should be the case. If I recall, that was the only edge I used as a constant, and tried to cut the other edges as necessary to maintain that top edge right on the centerline.

To answer your question about the edge at the top, yes it looks like you took too much off that edge. However without being there and looking at the whole thing, I could easily be wrong. In my case, that was the last edge (windshield to cowl edge) I trimmed, after I was satisfied with the bottom and side edges.

On my cowl, I STILL need to trim more clearance around the landing gear leg because it's too difficult to put on with the landing gear fairing in place.

We had some low productivity while we watched the airport snowblower do its thing.


Got the hinge lined up and pilot drilled. Some of the holes were done on the bench.


Here it is, pinned in place.


As others have observed, the cowl hits the cooler. I have sanded off the front edge, relieved the corner, and finally sanded down the bolt head.

Bryan,

Your plane is coming along nicely. It looks great.

If you are having any further interference with the oil cooler you can file down the posts that the bolts go through that stick up from the top. You can also take a little bit of material off the front top plate of the cooler.

When I was fitting my cowling I had to trim the front cowling intake openings so they did not cause interference with the front cylinders of the engine to get a proper fit.

You’ve got most of the hard parts done. The light at the end of the tunnel is near.

Jake

Two more things on the oil cooler:

First be gentle when doing any trimming and fitting of the oil cooler and don’t do anything that will weaken its structural integrity.

Second is that final trimming of the oil cooler should not be done until you fit and install your engine baffles. Your engine baffles will likely push out the cowling a slight bit as you create a tight seal between the baffling and the cowling. As such you may not have as much of an interference issue with the cooler as it appears without the baffles.

Jake