Chapter 7 - Step 2 - Contouring the Bottom

March 20, 2005
First let me start by stating that if it weren't for the group of folks who have forged the trail building this plane before, a project like this would be MUCH more difficult. The assistance that the community of builders can offer is amazing. This was one of those moments.

There was a recent clarification in the plans that had you remove some foam around the aft end of the aircraft around where the main spar will eventually go. This is a somewhat recent change and as always I love to go look at other builder's sites to see if what I have built in my mind as what a finished product should look like is the same as other's reality in building.... In this case I couldn't find an example... so I resorted to asking the builders mailing list if anyone had a good picture of a plane build using the updated instructions and within a very short time I was sent many responses and lots of pictures from other builders like the Cozy Girls (their plane is coming along nicely), and Tim Andres send me about 10 pictures and John Distefano sent me this picture:

This is John Distefano's plane. He is a bit ahead of me in the building process and was nice enough to snap a picture and send it to me of exactly what I needed to see to have a warm fuzzy in moving forward. Thanks John and Chrissie and Tim. I owe you a drink of your choice at a fly-in one of these days.

NOTE TO BUILDERS: This is what it should look like now. This includes the changes to plans outlined in newsletter 78-2 Update 1.

On to building - After John sent me this fabulous picture I trotted back out to the garage and began to pluck away the foam in the areas I had envisioned and confirmed. I then contoured those areas so that glass would lay on them properly when glassed.

That being done I moved on to a bit of contouring on the bottom. For this i used the plans described method of making a 45 degree cut down the side to about 25" forward of the firewall. I used a jig saw to do this but they don't seem to make 12" long jig saw blades so I bought a sawzall blade and took the grinder to it at the top where it attaches to the jig saw until it was the right size and shape to fit perfectly (ok - it fit if not perfectly) into my jig saw. I made the first big cut and then went back and sanded this down till I was 1/4" into the lower longeron as described in the plans. The plans then has you make 2 more cuts, one above the previous cut and the other below. This gets you 80% of the rough shape of the side contour. I didn't make the cuts I just uses a sander and sanded the cuts in. Takes a bit longer but I didn't feel that I had the right tool (don't like the hacksaw blade idea) to maintain the right level of control. I didn't want to take too much off.

Now... There is a tool designed by Tim Lumpp made expressly for this next bit. It has been passed around from builder to builder and I am now in possession of this tool. I love this sort of thing. The deal with it is that the builder who has it pays the freight to send it to the next person. So I will pay to send it on the the next builder in need of it just as was done for me. It's pretty cool. Each builder that has used it has added to the note that was in with the tool. Some have added supplies. I'll do the same :-) cause I'm cheesy like that.

Anyway.... this tool is made for final contouring of the bottom. Below is one picture of what it did in just a couple of passes. I didn't finish because I had been at it for 8 hours today already and it was dinner time. I hate to miss dinner so tomorrow I'll move on.

March 27, 2005(Easter Weekend)
This week saw only the completion of the contour of the bottom of the plane. I added some pictures above to complete the full picture of what that updated area should look like.

Next week I will be in the Florida Keys for a vacation celebration. I'm not sure if I'll get around to the weekly update then.

July 24th, 2005 - A Return to Work

This weekend saw a return to work after vacation, work domination and various other things that have been tying up my time for the last several months. I also thing it was inspired by Oshkosh coming up next week, which I and another local builder will be attending for 5 days. (Wed - Sun)

Well the first thing I managed to get back to was this area around the landing brake which needed to be sanded down 1/16th of an inch so that some overlapping layups that occur later don't cause unneccessary bumps. I started doing this by getting out the router and setting up a bunc of complicated ways of making this happen and then I realized I had the perfect tool. The Fein Sanding tool. (Yes that is spelled correctly). I whipped this out in no time and because the sanding tool attachment for the Fein tool is small and triangular it got right into those corners with no difficulty (something I was still trying to work out with the router. (Picture Below Left)

That worked so well I did the required sanding on the forward portion of the fuselage including F-22 so that the nose layups don't cause bumps later as well. (Below Middle)

After you get all of that worked out to depth perfectly the plans call for you to 5-Min epoxy that landing break back in place. I did it with a hot glue gun. It doesn't smell as bad as 5Min Epoxy and works just as well for something like this. (Below Right)

After that I did some of what I have been doing too much of these days. See here.

Not too much of that though.... back to it. OK. A quick look at the plans tells me that I have very little left to start the bottom layups and one of those things is to install the RST antennas before the layups. This required that I refer to Jim Wier's (from RST) instructions for installation that were sent with the antennas that I previously ordered.... One good thing about composite aircraft is that radio waves find them pretty invisible so all of the antennas can be imbedded in the skin of the aircraft instead of installing the 'spam can' style 'drag whip' antenna. Adding up those extra knots :-)

Well the instructions proved a bit evasive and a 1.5 hour search of the house unearthed them under my side of the bed collecting dust. A bit of light reading before bed time ya know... Back out to the garage and some reading and internet research and more reading and crap.... A trip to Radio Shack, or McShack as Jim Wier likes to call it, to get the R48 cable needed, a soldering iron, solder, flox, b-n-c connectors and other misc stuffs. Back home at the big table. A bit of brushing up on those old soldering skills that haven't been used in about 5 years and I find that... Wow do I suck at this now.... Better brush up some more... Practice, practice, practice....I don't want something failing that is soldered in the skin of the aircraft. That would have a huge suck factor. Ahhhh.. Now it is starting to come back to me... These joints are starting to look like they are suppoesd to. OK enough practice... Let's read throught that manual a bit more... (Below Left)

Ok, I now have the full picture. After a bit of measuring and alot of line drawing and cable route planning, I finally maganged to router out those cable troughs under the skin. (Below right).

Well that was enough to get a good taste again! I feel great and I have the urge and desire to build again. After next week, when I will be in Oshkosh and hopefully getting very inspired by other builders and their planes I am planning on really getting at it with Vigor again! Today helped me to remember how great it is to get out there and do something on this plane. I began to dream again. Work has really be sapping me of my will to build and I am happy that I am in a bit of a lull and had a bit of vacation to get the old juices flowing again.

August 9th, 2005

Back at it again this week with a bit of cleaning and a bit of work each night for the last couple nights. I started this past weekend with a good cleanout of the epoxy cabinet. After being off for so long the hardner was starting to develop crystals and the pump needed a bit of a 'spring cleaning' so I cleaned it out and took the pump apart and cleaned it all out. I threw away my remaining epoxy and called Wick's to order more. Another easy dealing with Wick's Aircraft. The order shipped on-time and arrived on-schedule Monday. I only put what I knew I was going to use in the next week or 2 in the pump and I checked the ratios by weight using an accurate scale.

Monday I went out, read through the plans for the next step, realized that I hadn't put in the step reinforcement yet on the pilot's side. I also gave in to the fact that the new channels for the updated antenna locations needed to be put in place and the old ones filled with micro or flox or something. After a parusing of a couple of other builder's websites I realized that there was a better way to orient the antennas that wouldn't effect the reception capabilities of them much and would actually separate them better than the way the plans show. I realized that the plans suggest that orientation because they assumed that you are going to put in a Loran ground plane. Nobody uses Loran anymore so there is no reason to work around an antenna that isn't there! Argh!!!! Ok... So I have to cut new channels. Oh well...

I cut those in and then layed out the new locations. (seen below). I in some foam where my antenna would cross the old wire tracks so that I could lay in my antenna (made from a kit from RST Engineering) after sanding it down. I only had to do this in 2 locations because my marker beacon antenna (the long straight one) didn't move.

On the far right picture below, you will see that block that I had to do a bit of fancy cutting on. It is along the left side of the picture about 2/3 of the way up. This is the wood reinforcement for the step on the pilot's side. Also in this picture you can see that I used micro to fill in the old channels and to set in the new channels with the antenna wiring in them. This represent the first bit of wiring that I get to do on the airplane. I wasn't happy about having to fill in extra channels, but I am much happier with the orientation of the antennas. A good thick mix (cold honey thick) of micro self levels and doesn't run too far and seemed to work well for this.

Next working day on the airplane I will sand down any rough areas on the belly, contour that step reinforcement and perform a final cleaning of the airplane so that It is ready for the 2-ply Uni on the bottom! I talked my wife into being my epoxy mixer for that project. Just having someone to keep you in micro and epoxy really helps.