The new upper cowling is finally looking good and much better than I expected. Starting out, I hot glued a couple 1/4" rods from the outside trailing edge of the wing root to the trailing edge of the aft most part of the new cowling foam. To make sure both sides ended in the same place with the same angles, I set up the laser and marked the foam for centerline. I then took sheets of 3/16" white foam and filled the gap between the engine and wingroot. The nice thing about the white foam is that it is sturdy but flexible enough to allow a very nice contour. I decided to let the natural mounting point corners decide the shape of the foam sheet and to my surprize, the foam instantly took on a pressure recovery shape which means the prop will see efficient airflow! :) Win! This was actually one of the original intentions for changing the exhaust system as well. I will now have much more efficient airflow to the most productive blade area on the prop which is the outermost 2/3rds of each blade length. I'm not entirely sure how the lower cowling shape will pan out but I don't see any unknown surprises. I also was able to add a nice radiused edge using green foam blocks. There are a couple more areas in need of radius before glass work begins, but I'm at most a day away from glasswork and am very pleased with what I see already :)
