Last Modified October 8th 1998

Cooking Lessons

September 1st Removed the flaps, ailerons and trim tabs ready for baking. All of the assembly hardware for each wing was placed in plastic ice cream containers so it wouldn't get lost. I added one extra layer of bid to the hinge areas on the wings and stabilators in line with the recommendation issued by Europa in the last technical bulletin. Where practical I made these bid areas 5cm wider each side than the original reinforcing bid. Peel ply was applied to the bid to ensure that a smooth surface was made for the hinges to sit against.

September 2nd Trimmed the lay-ups.

September 3rd - 4th No building.

September 5th Baking time! I made a large box out of the stage 1 & 2 cardboard boxes, laid blue foam sheets along the sides and top and covered the lot with every spare blanket we had in the house. I had to make up some roof supports out of 2 x 1 timber as the top flaps sagged quite a bit without them. Heat was provided by a 2kw fan heater at one end and a 1kw at the other blowing in through holes cut in the ends. The heaters were plugged into my bake controller box and the sensors laid out in the box.

I found the best place for the temperature sensors controlling the heaters was about 1/3 of the way in from each end, 10cm off the ground and sheltered from the direct air flow from the heaters. To ensure good airflow within the oven I put a fan inside to stir the air up. The temperature was ramped up at 2 degrees Celsius per 15 minutes then baked at 49-50c for 10 hours before ramping back down at the same rate. A couple of thermometers place about 20cm from the top showed the upper box temperature sitting between 49 and 51c for the duration of the bake. I found that once the temperature reached 48c the 1kw heater had to be left full on and the 2kw used via the computer controller.

The pieces to be baked were supported off the floor with blocks of blue foam. My garage floor is a solid concrete slab which with the boxes only has a single piece of cardboard acting as insulation on the base. I am sure that this could be made a lot more efficient if the floor was insulated as well but as I could achieve bake temperature with the two heaters I wasn't concerned with floor insulation. I didn't clamp the edges of the baked pieces after first having confirmed that other builders didn't experience problems and like the others, everything came out of the oven straight and true.

This first bake included the stabilators, one flap, one aileron, the fin and the trim tabs.

September 6th Second bake. This bake included the starboard wing and the other flap. My oven (read garage) isn't long enough to take the wing and spar end so I made a hole in the end for the spar to poke out of. The spar ends will end up being baked when I do the complete aircraft following filling. The ends of the wing were quite close to the fan heaters so I made up a couple of barriers with firewall heat insulation to deflect the direct airflow away from the wing root and tip.

I spent some time working on a design for an electric trim tab for my port aileron. I have seen two other Europa's with these and both owners report that they are very useful. I still own a spare aileron so I am using that to experiment before working on my live aileron.

September 7th Final bake. Second wing, rudder and aileron were baked.

September 8th I didn't burn the house down, didn't melt my plane and kept four cats very warm so I guess it was a successful bake! Stefan and I dismantled the oven which took just as much time as it did to build it in the first place!

September 9th Sanded back a few places where the top and bottom moldings didn't quite fit. Added a few strategically placed clecos to check the final alignment of the moldings. I placed these at the front, mid way in the door, 1 metre aft of the door, foot of the base joggle and at the back of the aircraft. The top didn't quite fit around the tail and I finally nailed it down to the fact that I hadn't trimmed the lower flange in that area. Trimmed the flange!

September 10th Starting at the front of the aircraft and working my way progressively to the rear I applied clecos every 10cm or so along the flanges. I missed out a section mid door where the lower molding was indented against the cockpit module. This will be filled in later. As I approached the tail I ran out of clecos but a quick call to Nev Hay who lives near by and is building a Cri Cri fixed that problem. All told I used around 50 clecos and will need another 20 or so to fit the fin and stern post in place.

September 11th As I had a visitor coming round to view the aircraft in the afternoon I rigged the complete plane for the first time ever. I needed to cut out the lower flange from the fin so that it would sit on the tail stub. Everything went together well, even the fin sits so that it is perfectly in line with the tail stub, and all controls were full and free. It was really satisfying to, at last, have something that looked like an aircraft.

I spent a little time scraping and sanding back a few resin ridges that were on the wings before my visitor arrived.

On dismantling the aircraft I discovered that the socket that accepts the port wing had cracked free from the rear of the seat back. This was as a result of the wings settling at an angle steeper than the design 2.5 degrees. Remounting the socket is simple to do as it is only held in place with Redux. Next time I rig the wings for the pin setup process I'll rig the port wing, support it in place at 2.5 degrees and then rig the starboard wing before supporting that at 2.5 degrees.

September 12th Worked on the wing inspection plates. I have made these out of lexan and with the backing plate made out of four layers of bid rather than using the wing skin with two additional layers of bid as specified in the manual. I drilled through both the lexan and the backing plate and fitted nutplates to the backing plate. I covered the lexan with thin tape and smeared mould release wax over the tape and around the edges before attaching the lexan to the backing plate ensuring the screws fitted flush with the holes in the backs of the nutplates. A bit of wax was smeared on the nutplates and tips of the screws to prevent them being bonded in place. I pushed back the foam around the hole and applied flox prior to bedding the backing plate and lexan in place. I applied some duct tape to the wing surface to keep the plates in place while the flox set.

I cut out the foam from the fin rear edge.

As I had a few wing fitting that still needed priming I removed the fittings from the port wing. As I removed the outrigger arms I noticed a small crack in the paint I had applied a year or so earlier. Placing a craft knife blade under the paint I was dismayed to find that the System 3 paint and primer simply peeled off the alodyned metal surface. Interestingly enough, another plate that was alodyned, primed and painted at exactly the same time as the first had a good surface bond. I dismantled the port outrigger mechanism and removed as much of the paint and primer as I could by knife peeling it away. I will buy some paint stripper tomorrow and remove the paint and primer from all my externally mounted metalwork then reprime it with Zinc Chromate and paint with Poly Fiber finish coat. I am not going to reprime and paint the internally fitted parts as that would be too difficult but I feel that it is worth doing the external pieces.

Finished the day off by spending some time working on my panel with Panel Planner software. I discovered that the Europa panel (Europanl2) that I submitted to Panel Planner some time ago is now supplied with release 2.5 of the software. Unfortunately the writers didn't include the panel width which is 28.9 inches so this has to entered when the panel is first loaded. The new panel image is better than the one originally supplied with the software as it is a direct representation of the individual faces of the instrument panel rather than the original front projected image.

13th September Snuck into the garage before breakfast and checked that I could remove the wing inspection plates. I could.

14th September Took off the metal plates from the starboard wing and dismantled the outrigger mechanism. I used a good quality paint stripper to take off the paint then went through the complete metal preparation process again and re alodyned all of the pieces.

15th September No building. Sydney for the day.

16th September No building. Organised all of my technical documentation.

17th September Finished applying flox to the wing inspection holes. A flange of flox needed to be added between the reinforcing ring and the inside of the bellcrank hole to seal it. I dug out a bit of the foam between the two glass surfaces and filled between with flox. To ensure I got a nice smooth edge I applied peel ply all over the flox. I pulled off the partially free spar socket and reduxed it back in place using my dummy spar as a locator. I added 1cm redux and flox flange this time to ensure that the socket wouldn't come off again in a hurry.

18th September Dashed into the workshop before work to clear everything out of the way of Carol's car. Pulled the peel ply off the inspection holes. With a bit of effort extracted the dummy spar and then (with some difficulty) sanded back the bit of redux which had bled up into the socket. Just to finish things off I knocked the starboard flap off the wing and introduced a small crack into the trailing edge at the outboard tip! Mutter.

19th September Drilled out the 1/4 inch holes in the outrigger support brackets to 3/8 inch in accordance with a recommended modification from Europa. The demonstration Europa flying in the UK has shown wear on these support brackets and the insertion of bearings is recommended. An FL9 bearing fitted to each of the 3/8 inch holes.

I painted all of my wing metalwork with zinc chromate primer. The glass on the wings was masked with masking tape and the insides of the bearing was masked with Humbrol Maskol - a throw back to my railway modelling! Maskol is a latex mask that is applied with a paint brush and then simply peeled off afterwards. I also primed my undercarriage frame. I had debated back and forth as to whether to paint this but in the end decided that it looked better painted. Before I painted the piece I cleaned it with isopropyl alcohol and gave the surface a fine sanding with 1200 grit paper. The bearings were masked with Maskol prior to applying the primer.

20th September I must admit I have been trying to avoid this day for as long as possible. The wings on the Europa have three lift pins each and these have to be inserted into the metal plates that were embedded in the root lay-ups on the wings and the flaps. The challenge is that these pins must be in line with the spars and also in line fore aft. If they aren't inserted correctly then the wings become difficult if not impossible to insert and remove! Needless to say I approached this task with some trepidation. The first thing I did was reattach the flaps to each wing and then clamp the aileron and flaps in line to establish the correct wing shape. Taking each wing in turn, I laid the wing up on a pair of sawhorses so that a line running between the centres of the spar holes was horizontal. To do this I used some spare blue foam on the outboard sawhorse and checked the level against a line I had drawn between the spar holes. I found a convenient location on my drill to mount a small spirit level and then bonded this to the drill so that it showed me a level when I was drilling horizontally. Having marked out each of the drilling locations I followed the manual's instructions and placed a straight edge parallel to the spar with part of the straight edge overhanging to provide a sight line. I found between 7-10cm to be the best spacing as any more was more hindrance than help. The spirit level on the drill simplified alignment in the vertical plane and it was simple to check the horizontal alignment against the straight edge.

I made a small pilot hole using a 1/16" drill bit to ensure that the next drill would locate properly. This initial hole was made only a couple of mm into the metal and essentially was the same as counterpunching the part. I then drilled each hole with a sequence of drills - 3mm, 6mm, 8mm, 9.5mm and then finishing off with a 13/32" drill. The larger sides bite hard when going through each piece of metal so a slow speed drill is important at this stage. With the holes drilled I tapped each hole with a 12mm taper tap and then followed up with an intermediate tap.

I tested each lift pin and all fitted nicely. Redux was applied to the holes and the lift pins and the forward wing and flap pins reinserted. It is at this stage of the installation that you discover that you need the lift sockets and pip pins in order to finish off the installation. I wonder how many builders overlooked the line that says you should check that you can insert the pip pins before you finish. I certainly wouldn't want to be one of those as it could be quite interesting getting the sockets lined up later! Having located my pins and sockets I wound out the aft wing pins until I could fit the socket and insert the pin. It is impossible to insert the pin from the top at this stage due to the fact that the flange impedes insertion of the pin. Having removed the support ring from the pin I filed back a small area of the flange until I could insert the pin from the top. This final stage is not really necessary as a hole will be drilled in the wing top later but does act as a sanity check!

I must say that I worried about this stage more than I really needed too as having established a method for installing the pins the actual installation was quite simple and what is more, I completed a whole chapter of the manual in one afternoon!

September 21st Back at the tail of the plane I started on the setup and alignment of the fin. A mark was place near the tip on the starboard side 25mm away from the foam and a straight edge clamped along the trailing edge of the fuselage to intercept this mark. My mark and the trailing edge are exactly in line so that saved any messing around on that bit. Even better, when the fin is sitting on its base the leading edge perfectly fairs into the fuselage so no shims were required to establish a good line. I placed four clecos on the flange to establish its final position though did note that these clecos pull the edge of the fin inwards quite a bit. When it comes to final bonding I will use some small washers between the fuselage and fin flange at the cleco points to keep the flange from buckling.

I removed the fin from the aircraft and placed the fin upright on a sheet of paper. Nathan drew around the base and cutout the paper so that it would fit on the foam inside the flange. The positions of the lightening cores was marked out on the piece of paper to make a cutting template. This job was simplified by placing a torch inside each lightening hole in turn and then drawing around the outline.

The template was cut out to match the lightening holes, placed on the fuselage fin stub and the hole positions transferred to the stub.

I have discovered one advantage of the Europa Classic over the XS. I can take my fin off to get the fuselage in its jig out of the garage door!

I finished off the day by phoning Europa. The trailing edges of the aileron and flap on my port wing line up perfectly but on my starboard wing the edge of the flap is 6mm aft of the aileron. As the spacing of the flap and aileron within their respective flanges is correct I can only assume that this is a core mounting or manufacture induced problem. I wanted a bit of advice from the factory as to whether I should extend the aileron, shorten the flap or do both. Rogers opinion that I could leave it as it was if I wanted. In the end I came to the conclusion that taking 6mm off the flap was the best option to pursue.

Over the past few weeks I have been playing around with instrument panel concepts. My current thinking is shown in the picture below which is screen captured from Panel Planner.

I am happy with the main panel layout at this stage however the right hand panel needs some more work.

September 22nd Cut out the holes in the fuselage fin stub. As there was a small gap between the top of the fin stub and the foam within the fin I cut some 1/16" ply to act as packing on the bars between the first four lightening holes. The ones further aft were within the 2-3mm gap specified within the manual and therefore didn't require any packing. I started trimming the sternpost that I bought from Graham Singleton. This is not a standard part on the original Europa but is on the XS. Graham's sternpost is designed to simplify what can be one of the messiest lay-ups on the aircraft by removing the need to fit multiple layers of bid within the fin closeout. Having the sternpost will also allow me to do a lot of the new tailwheel setup before closing off the top of the aircraft.

September 23rd No building

September 24th Helped with unpacking two Europa's at the freight depot then gave one of the new builders a quick lesson on fibreglassing and building gotchas. SAANZ meeting.

September 25th Cut out the hole for the fuel filler modification and did the glassing for the filler hole support. The reason I did this out of sequence was that I was looking after a bulkhead modification kit overnight and this kit had a hole positioning jig unlike the kit I had received!

September 26th Trimmed back my starboard flap so that it lined up with its aileron. I then spent a few hours trimming the flanges on this wing to the required clearance. I followed the XS guideline for the flap which has you tape mixing sticks along the line where the flap intercepts the flange and then cut the flange back to clear the sticks.

September 27th Trimmed the flanges on the port wing. Had to go and buy a new vacuum cleaner as I got grizzled at for making a mess of our house one. I spent a bit of time on the wing surfaces removing the occasional resin drip and bump that had appeared during the manufacturing process. The wings, apart from their fuselage fairings, are now ready for filling.

Feeling enthusiastic I decided to do some surface filling. I have bought Polyfiber's Super Fil filler for this task and am following their instructions for using the product. The fin, rudder and stabilators were first wiped down with acetone and then handed over to Stefan who washed them down with a weak soap and water mix. We made up 75 gram batches of Super Fil at a time for the job though we'll do 90 grams next time as there seems to be plenty of working time at this time of year. Stefan laid on the initial scratch coat with a metal bladed plasterers edge and then I followed up with a _very_ thin filler coat. It took only two hours to fill one side each of the rudder, fin and stabilators and was a much easier job than I had expected. Comments from another builder indicate that the original Europa filler works out 60% heavier than Super Fil which I can believe as Supafil is incredibly light.

Found an NZ source for the closed foam rollers used for the Polyfiber primer and silver shield UV barrier. I had thought this would be a problem but they are imported by Paint Aids - Guthrie Bowron stock them.

My friendly local panelbeater put me onto a source of 3M dust fee Hook-It sanding splines. These rather nice devices have a vacuum hose attachment and use velcro attached sandpaper with holes in to suck up the sanding dust. I bought a 390mm spline and a 170mm spline for sanding the surfaces. A bit of masking tape wrapped around the attachment end allowed them to be used with my domestic vacuum cleaner.

September 28th First sanding experience. Sanding the parts was easier than I thought it was going to be. The 3M vacuum splines make a big difference as there is almost no dust at all that appears as a result of the sanding process. I had also bought some 3M surface marker. This is a black powder that gets applied with a pad over the whole surface to be sanded. The basic principal of sanding is - when you hit the glass, stop! If lucky the sanded part will only show glass and blue filler, if it shows black then that area is too low and needs to be filled some more. I sanded back the fin and rudder and then filled up some low spots. On these first sides I didn't use anything to control the depth of the filler going on and I didn't apply peel ply to the surface after filling. I am going to use fishing line as a depth indicator and peel ply the surfaces on the next sides and see if it makes it any easier.

September 29th Sanded the stabilators and filled the low spots. Finished sanding the fin and rudder. Used a bit of the spare Super Fil to fill in some resin voids around the door frames on the fuselage.

September 30th Enough sanding for this week. Marked out the shapes for the rudder cable pivot now that Graham Singleton has finished the design.