Brief Description: Lower cowling and air box: Part 1
The lower cowling attach/ air box assembly is a remarkable combination of structure and function. I freely admit that the design is patterned as much as possible after the Weseman's product offered for Zenith 601 models. Like the top cowling attach piece, this one also bridges the round nosebowl shape with a flat firewall bottom. But in addition, it collects outside air to feed the carburator, and provides a mechanism to draw hot air through the carburator (a.k.a. carb heat). An added feature here is that the hot air ducted to the carburator will be filtered.
In image one, I'm holding the 14"-long air box. At the front you can see a door that can be closed to block out the outside air. It's still being held by two 3/16" clecos, but will ultimately be held in place with AN3 hardware to allow easy removal and maintenance. At the far end of this box (on the 'roof') is a 4" x 6" hole that accepts a K&N air filter (image 3).
Image 2 shows the retaining box for the filter, that also has a 2.5" scat tubing flange clecoed in place. A short length of scat tubing will connect this with the carburator, which will hang about 3-4" above it.
Also visible just ahead of the filter retainer box is a 2" scat tubing flange that connects with the air box below it. At the top of image 2 is the airbox door control arm, which has a slit piece of orange 1/16" silicone held down over it. This is there to prevent too much air from passing through the gap surrounding the control arm.
