Went out to see fellow builder Roger. He has changed over to the 650 and received his plans and parts from ZAC. He fitted the 650 Canopy frame/latch members to his full kit - replacing the 601 XL parts he had already installed. While drilling the first pilot holes on the new, thicker, bigger 650 canopy with brand new drill bits designed for that purpose...disaster struck. The Canopy cracked and ran a good 6 inches vertical from the rt side frame at about the face of the panel up toward the panel. He invited me out to see the result.
While there we discussed many things and he asked if I had any interest in his old 601 Canopy as he was not going to use it. I accepted his offer, if for no other reason - to see how it would fit my Fuse that ison my all plans built vs the fact that frame was fully fitted to his full kit fuse. He offered me to take it now and we'll work out a price after I see if it fits. To my surprise.....it was nearly a perfect fit. I had to curve the bottom frame rails a bit more to fit my fuse than they were set up to fit his fuse. Actually it was more like "tweaking the bend" Other than that....perfect fit. Guess I'm following the plans measurements pretty close. If nothing else it was a great sanity check. My "home built actually matches a factory pre-drilled kit when finished (at least in shape and size)
I've thought about it a good bit and I've decided that I'm quite content with the old 601 canopy on my bird and I think I'll just continue to proceed in that direction buying the parts from Roger since he's comitted to the 650 version. It will mean a Huge savings to me. At least I'm leaning that way at the moment. (see page 2 for pic's)
