Brief Description: Drill F732A Channel to Frame & Fuselage
The first thing that I did today was position and drill the F732D attach angle to the aft face of the canopy frame. This whole area that I'm working on today was recently redesigned by Van's. I received a free upgrade kit that strengthen's how the canopy frame / rollbar is attached to the fuselage for better support in the case of a rollover. Anyway, I temporarily installed the canopy frame on the fuselage, along with the F732A top channel and discovered that I had to drill out several rivets holding the top skin to the F706 bulkhead since the aft end of the F732A angle and spacer now has a different and beefier rivet pattern. Once these rivets were removed, I used the prepunched holes in the channel to match-drill the top flange of the F706 bulkhead and top skin to the channel. I had to do this from underneath using a long drill bit. The next step was to match drill the side tabs of the channel to the web of the F706 bulkhead. While everything was still on the fuselage I drilled the forward end of the F732A channel to the attach angle on aft face of the canopy frame using the prepunched holes as a guide.
F732D angle drilled to aft face of canopy frame
F732A channel drilled to spacer, F706 bulkhead, and top skins
Forward end of F732A channel drilled to F732D attach angle
