Began the installation of the Will James Holy Cowl w/ Cold Air Induction System (CAS). Most of the day was spent in trial and error. I was really worried about cutting the cowl and rightly so. Will Jame puts out his own instructions for his cowl, and I follwed his plans. He begins by having you hot glue some metal to the front of the cowl to self align the top of the cowl with the spinner. I did this, but later when trying to fit the cowl the hot glue would let go and wouldn't hold/support the cowl. I was getting frustrated, as I marked the cowl 3 different times using the 'tool' will had you make (a 1/4" x 4" .020 alum strip with the end bent up 1/8". you slide it under the cowl mark the alum, and then take it out turn it around and use the mark to mark the cowl trim line. Things kept changing and I finally determined that the hot glued cowl supports were not holding. So I drilled the supports #40 and then match drilled them to the cowl ( I'll fill the holes when finishing) Then clecoed the supports in and that did the trick. With the cowl clamped to the flange w/ 1/4" spacers, I sanded the upper cowl aft edge to match the upper fwd fuse skin with the cowl clamped in place, it took a lot of itterations but it seemed to work out pretty good. The seam is very tight and should provide a good cosmetic appearance.
This is what finally worked out the best ( supports clecoed to the upper cowl)
This is the fixture that Aero Composites sent for mounting the cowl
After much angst I'm happy with the outcome..... so far.......
