Seatback Keel

Because I am waiting for cures alot now I have started working several parts in parallel. The seat back keel is one of them. I cut out all of the spacers and sides per plans as well as the little wooden parts that the fuel selector valve attaches to. I glassed them on one side and then realized that I glassed the wrong side on 2 of the parts. Not a big deal since they eventually get glassed anyway. I'll just have to be careful with them when I work with them.

I have decided to depart the plans here again with regard to the aluminum bracket that holds the fuel selector valve. The plans call for an aluminum bracket that you bend and manufacture yourself, but I recently read on another builder's site (name eludes me right now otherwise I'd be happy to give credit) that they decided to make one out of 8 plays of bid. This makes a tone of sense to me since I have very little in the way of metal handling capabilities at this time. I am geared for composite manufacture. I know how to work with composite and it's easier to make a complex bracket out of this stuff than aluminum. I have also read that many builders have had problems with this piece of aluminum cracking on them. No complaints about the composite one though, but I am sure that the sample size would be much smaller though.

Jan 23, 2005 - More Work on the Seat back Keel and Heat Duct (Duck :-)

Today I managed to get all of the parts for the seat back keel and heat duct floxed together. They are curing on the kitchen counter much to the dislike of my wife due to the fact that there is already a bit of permanent epoxy stuck to that part of the counter from a previous curing in that area. I do have racks in the basement but this area of the house stays warmer than the basement and I want these things cured enough to work with them when I come home from work tomorrow.

On a more technical note: this job was pretty easy. I did have my wife (Julie) help me with holding a couple things here and there as I put clamps on them. That made it go a bit easier.

IF I HAD THIS TO DO AGAIN. - The plans call for you to layup one side of the spacers and then layup the otherside while you put the keel together. Had I thought about this more I would have summarily ignored this bit and layed up both sides prior to putting them in the keel. This would avoid a slightly tricky layup after all of the spacers have been placed and 5-minute epoxied in place. All you would have to do then is use a bit of 5 minute epoxy and flox the sides and corners making for a much easier setup.

A TRICK TO PASS ALONG - Pieces of 2x4 work great to act as spacers here.

Here is a picture of the replaced bracket duct taped in place for cure in the kitchen. i'll get a better picture of it later. 10 ply bid tape worked GREAT for this.

Update - Jan 30, 2005 - Scrapped Heat Duct, Tapes and Worked on Cleanup

Well this week I decided to scrap the heat duct that I worked on last week. After taking it out of the clamps I came to the realization that it got clamped slightly crooked. This caused the whole heat duct to warp when it was straightened. I cut it apart and sanded down the parts to re clamp them but after cutting and then verifying that the parts were perfect I realized that they were not and that re-floxing and putting them back together would only cause them to still be cooked and unsatisfactory to me. I could probably fix them with the existing foam but... It just doesn't seem right and this is the second mistake I made on the heat duct. Sometimes it is just better to redo the part. It wont take that long to redo. I did have to order additional foam from Wick's Aircraft though. I expect it to ship Monday and be here Wednesday or Thursday, just in time for the pre-weekend prep and layups. In the mean time I have a ton of little stuff I can clean up.

I flipped the fuselage over today (below left) so that I could tape the front of the front passanger (center) seatback in as well as the foreward face of the forward landing gear fuselage (right). I have an outstanding question that I put to the group about this so I am hoping to get an answer tonight and be able to do them with confidence tomorrow.

Since I was unable to get too much done this weekend due to questions, a fouled heat duct and too much 'real job' stuff, I decided to re-organize 'The Hangar' (read: garage) and put in some additional shelving to help organize things. You wouldn't belive how many little bits you will need to have going on when you do something like this. After all of that re-organization I even developed a list of things that I will need to get done this week so that next weekend will allow me to get the fuselage bottom started.

- Finish bulkhead tapes
- Install lower portion of the firewall
- Trim up and sand all remaining tapes that need trimmed
- Re-drill any holes covered by tapes
- Reconstruct the heat duct and install it and the seat back keel
- Flip Fuselage back over and prep for bottom install

I think I can manage that all this week...

Update - Feb 6, 2005

Let's see...
I recut the heat duct parts (front heat duct) and the result was much better than the first time. (Below left) I layed up the inside of the parts per plans and let them cure for a couple days before trimming them with the Fein tool and floxing them together. This time around I cut out some perfectly sized spacers for the main body of the front heat duct. These I screwed to the table with one edge on a line to align them perfectly. At the front where the duct widens to meet the control panel, I cut a wedge out of foam and inserted it until I had the right width. All in all it is much better than the first time.

One of the big improving factors is my redesign of the heating of the garage. Previously I had a heater that I couldn't trust to leave on and was not very efficient. It also had to be turned on and off a lot because it was a 30-60000BTU heater that was overpowering for my well insulated garage. What I replaced it with was an vent-free 160000BTU heater with 3 settings (6000 - 12000 and 16000 BTU). This heater has a pilot light, requires no electricity, is meant for enclosed use, has an O2 sensor and runs on propane. It is also WAY more efficient than the old heater and can be left on un-attended. This means that I can build curing jigs (a la this heat duct thing) and not have to move the part for cure. This was the cause of the last heat duct slipping out of square. It also has DRAMATICALLY lowered cure times for stuff that I can't bring into the house (fuselage layups - Landing gear bulkhead). On medium with the temp in the low 30's / high 20s this heater keeps the garage easily around 78 F. During the day I have to turn it on low to keep the temps under 85F. It is also silent in its operation.

Back to the building... I also took off the temporary firewall and installed the lower portion of the permanent firewall. (top right - Lower left - Lower Center) I floxed this on per plans after transferring the exact locations of the stringers and lower longeron from the temporary firewall and cutting them out (actually I made a mistake here...) to match perfectly.

MISTAKE - I made the mistake of cutting the stringer holes out back in chapter 4 (despite the fact that the plans tell you not to. I had to fill in with a bit of flox because they werent in the exact place.

Good thing - This whole part went pretty smoothly because I spent so much time truing things up and making sure that they were level early on in this chapter, so once I had the firewall all cut out it went in right on 90 degrees. That makes you feel good.

Since I don't have the heat duct done I am going to have to wait on the bottom. Since I am waiting on cures I started on Chapter 8 stuff. There are a lot of little things to build there so it's a good thing to work on while waiting on cures. Go check it out...! Hurry!