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Bob's RV-8 Build Site
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Date:  12-28-2019
Number of Hours:  3.10
Manual Reference:  
Brief Description:  Canopy Handle, fitting, locating

Began working the skirts again. The skirts are fitting pretty darn good in the front portion of the frame all the way till they have to curve back to go over the rear part of the canopy. There are 1/4 inch gaps on each side and I am trying to figure out how to get it all to lay flat.

You really can't fill such big gaps with fiberglass filler as it would look HORRIBLE and add a ton of weight. So the issue is to get the skirts to lay flat which may take some creative cutting and reshaping of the skirts. This is where my lack of knowledge and expertise in fiberglass work is really rearing it's ugly head.

I decided that it was time to redo my tape lines and retape the canopy to protect it and give me access to the lines I need.

The skirts were repeating very well every time I removed and replaced them and they seemed to be in their groove so to speak. I needed to get the front portions to nestle in so I trimmed the front portion of the skirts with the top skin and decided to drill the handle location.

The best way I thought of to drill the location for the handle was to put the skirt back in place and then I took a bright LED flashlight and put it against the handle tubing. It shown through in a perfect round circle and I used a Sharpie to mark the location. Then I used a Unibit to drill it out. The location and fit worked perfectly!

I worked around checking the fit some more and decided to drill out a couple of places in the canopy frame rivet locations to get solid locator holes. I then looked at the overall fit and decided to trim a little more around the back end around the canopy slide rail.

Still lots of work to do on this.....I guess it will eventually work.......hopefully!
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Retaped lines

Retaped lines

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Handle hole drilled & front edge trimmed

Handle hole drilled & front edge trimmed

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