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My Airplane Projects
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Date: 2-1-2010
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Number of Hours: 5.00
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Manual Reference: 34-12
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Brief Description: Worked on canopy and latching mechanism.
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Went to the airport but did ground session only - too windy to fly with a new student, as usual. Got to the shop about 11 AM. Installed the latch mechanism, and fabricated the guide blocks while the shop warmed up. Then riveted the front of the canopy along the front bow. A few rivets are a little high, but the book says that is preferable to setting them too deep.
After lunch Carolyn came up to the shop with me and so I could work inside the plane and she could be the tool gopher and my safety pilot in case I somehow trapped my self in there. Right away we ran into a problem when I installed my carefully crafted guide blocks, and they proceeded to catch on the most aft side nut along the skirt. I overdid it on removing material, and effectively ruined the blocks. A bigger problem surfaced - the canopy wouldn't go all the way down on the left side where the side skirts have to overlap the side skins. Something changed a bit since screwing and riveting the canopy to the frame.
While working on this we noticed that the canopy frame was "catching" just a little bit on the right side as the canopy was raised. This was minor, but got my attention as I remembered other builders reporting damage to the skin from this interference. So at that point we broke our train of thought long enough to go back and install the allowed for washer in the mounting bolt to space the frame out away from the forward structure.
Returning to the non-overlap problem, I decided to "break" the top edge of the skin where it extends forward under the canopy. That is where the overlap was not happening. Unclecoed the skin and used the Cleaveland tool to break the edges inward on both sides of the fuselage. This gave us a real tight fit and just enough space to let the overlap happen when the canopy comes down. For now this is good enough. If I have to I can drill out the rivets on the side skirts and stick some shims in there, like some others have done.
Got back in the cockpit and worked on the latch mechanism, tweaking, adjusting.
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Canopy front riveted.
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My first "ride."
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I screwed up the guide block.
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