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Last Modified October 13th 1998
October 1st Sanded down a few of the areas that I had filled on the fuselage. 120 grit paper is just right for sanding back the Super Fil though 80 grit works well for quickly knocking back any high spots
October 2nd - 3rd No building
October 4th Sanded back the first side of the stabilators and rudder to 120 grit level. I used a straight edge followed by a blind feel test to determine how smooth the surfaces were and pencil marked a couple of places that need a bit more work.
Filled the second surface on each of the
stabilators. I used the fishing line method to control the depth
of the filler and must say that it makes application of the
filler much easier. I bought a reel of 0.7mm diameter fishing
line and six 12oz fishing weights. The weights were attached to
short lengths of line to make three depth guides. A 150 gram
batch of filler was made up and the entire surface scratch filled
to establish a primary bond. The scratch filling is a very thin
layer literally scratched back off the surface with the
applicator.
The filler was dumped at one end and roughly spread
out ensuring that the edges of the glass were well covered. The
fishing line was placed on the surface chordwise with one line
right on the edge and the other two at nine inch intervals. I am
using a 12 inch wide plaster applicator for spreading the filler.
The applicator was slowly drawn over the filler at a 30 degree
angle to bring the level of the filler down to the level of the
fishing line. A second pass smoothed the surface. This was
repeated over the next area before leap frogging the first line
over to a new position. The first batch of filler covered half
the surface and a second 150 gram batch covered the rest.
I left the grooves created by the fishing line as I
have found that filling small areas later with Super Fil is very
simple to achieve. I had thought that 0.7mm might be too thick
for the line. I did however find a couple of places where the
filler gets quite thin over the glass even with this thickness of
line so it looks as though I judged the thickness of line just
about right.
Once the filler set I applied 3M powder marker to
act as a sanding guide.
October 5th - 9th I had planned to do some metalwork and other little bits this week however the early arrival of a new nephew and the subsequent gathering of the clans in Auckland put paid to that plan.
Finally worked out how to mount the 65mm diameter inspection plate on the fin stub. An 18 thou feeler gauge works very nicely as a spring clip! The rivet holes mounting the clip to the panel have to be fairly close together in the centre otherwise the metal can't spring back far enough for it to be inserted under the flange.
October 10th
My replacement bulkhead arrived this week. I cut out the holes
and fitted the rear hole cover. The cover doesn't fit as well as
on the original bulkhead but there isn't anything I can do about
that as the hole is defined by the molding. I trimmed 3mm off
the top curve of the instrument panel and then tried it back in
place. It was very obvious that the side flanges of the panel
were going to have to be trimmed right back to the edge of the
panel so I did this. The area directly above the wheel well and
associated wheel well to fuselage flange needed quite a bit of
trimming until that area would sit against the firewall. After
trimming I was able to fit the instrument panel in place. The
flange on the lower side of the panel sits proud of the firewall
and I think I will make a pair of standoffs that attach to the
firewall to allow these to be supported.
October
11th Fitted Graham Singleton's stern post. This required
a fair amount of trimming back of the foam within the fin in
order to allow the stern post to be fitted but I did end up with
a good fit in the end. I am particularly please with the fit of
the base of the stern post as it exactly matches the curve of
the base of the fuselage. Considering the fact that the stern
post is curved fore-aft this was quite a challenge matching the
two curves in three dimensions. I clecoed the stern post in place
to establish its final position.
October 12th No building.
October 13th - 26th Working in the UK and USA.
