| day |
notes |
hours |
| 3 |
At last feeling a bit better after the chest infection. Roll fuselage out onto drive. Check 561.5mm dimension between outer edges of FL18s on straight-edge and slide them into the fuselage slots. Holding them fully forward, mark the aft edges of both FL18 on fuselage floor for reference. 2D (9.6mm) from centre of any FL18 mounting hole (4.8mm) is 7.2mm from edge of that hole. Mark with a fine felt-tip 7.5mm from edges of forward holes and draw lines through those marks. Hacksaw close to the line on FL18S and file down to it. Smooth the profile of the right-angle part to blend. Have another good look at it in daylight and file a little more to split the marked line. Smooth edges and corners with fine needle file, but don't try to chamfer this time. Similarly hacksaw and file FL18P. Offer each FL18 up to the fuselage slot and both are about 2mm forward of the marked line. Climb inside rear fuselage and with power file and spherical burr on Dremel grind away the BID where the forward edge of FL18S fits. Check progress at intervals against reference line, until FL18S is 6mm forward of its original position. That should get the hinge in the right place and allow for replacement BID layups where they have been ground away. Taper the aft face of the baggage bay bulkhead upwards from the ground-away area with the power file to provide a smooth transition. Repeat the process on the port side to get the same 6mm clearance and taper the bulkhead. Enlarge the hole at the top of the seatback with a taper reamer to admit the sight-gauge tubing. Pass a piece of stiff electrical wire through the hole and out the gap at the back by the filler. Tape the the sight-gauge tubing to it and draw it through to check that it will fit OK. Roll fuselage back into garage. |
2159.9 |
| 4 |
Searching the website for the UK distributors of Heyco bushes, find that although they only sell in industrial quantities, they do have a sample request service. So, request 4 each samples of the 6.4mm ID and 9.9mm ID bushes. |
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| 5 |
[11:15] Roll fuselage out onto front drive, tail down-slope. Pull trailer forward and unload stuff to get access to wings. Wheel out port wing and rig, inserting spar pins part-way and aft pip-pin. [11:51] Climb inside rear fuselage and with power file and Perma-Grit files, grind back BID throughout FL18 bonding areas port & starboard to surface of pre-preg, and taper off to both sides. To reduce protrusion of nylon screws under FL18s, try skimming the head of one in the lathe (held in a length of M4 hex spacer), but it's not very successful. Try filing and trimming with a razor blade on a second one, which is slightly better. Assemble FL18s to straight-edge with modified screws at outside edges and check 561.5mm width. Drop the assembly into place. Insert FL15 and position it on the port flap pin. Move engine and wheel out starboard wing. Slide spar in to just engage wing pins and position FL15 on flap pin. Takes quite a bit of wiggling for wing pins to go home but they do eventually. Insert aft pip-pin and tap spar pins home a bit more. Remove starboard flap hinge screw etc and try to thread the nylon line through the drilled M5 screw, but it won't go. Didn't have this trouble the first time, but eventually give up and drill out both screws from #68 to #66 using a pin vise, which does the trick. Thread line through drilled M5 screw, starboard flap hinge hole, FL18S hole, acrylic target and FL18P hole. Dismantle port hinge screw and thread line through it and drilled M5 screw. Knot line to secure. At starboard end, cut off reel, pull tight and fit clamp to secure. The FL18s now can be moved to the right position, and there is ample movement to spare, so should be plenty of room for replacement BID layup. [14:15] Stop for lunch. Heyco bush samples delivered. [15:30] Climb inside fuselage and check position of FL18s - can just see the nylon line through the FL16 slots - and confirm that there is adequate room for replacement layups. Remove nylon line and fittings. Re-fit flap hinge screws. Fit FL16s to FL18s. Clamp FL15 lugs to FL16s with wooden softening blocks. Check movement - all seems OK. FL15 just touches baggage bay bulkhead when flaps retracted but there seems to be no problem achieving full up travel of flaps. Check sideways float of FL15 - not very much at either retracted or extended position of flaps. Original marks obliterated by grinding, so mark on fuselage floor along inboard edge of both FL18 at each extreme of side float. Check fit of Heyco bushes on fuel tubing; 6.4mm ID ones are fine, but 9.9mm ID ones seem a bit of a tight fit. Remove spar pins and with help from neighbour Ollie to wiggle wingtips, remove aft pip-pins. De-rig starboard wing and put away in trailer. Move engine. De-rig port wing and wheel back to trailer. Re-load trailer and close up. Couple car and re-park trailer. [17:35] Unclamp FL15/FL16s. Dismantle FL16s/FL18s. Wheel fuselage back into garage. [18:10] |
2165.6 |
| 6 |
Measure size of BID needed to give overlap of 50mm beyond all ground-back areas around FL18s. Abrade those bonding areas with coarse Perma-Grit flexible sheet., vacuum out dust and degrease with acetone. Mark and cut 4 off BID 180mm x 165mm, with notch 90mm x 65mm for FL18/FL16 slot. Cut peel-ply to size. Start fan heater below fuselage. Mix a peg-2 (45g) batch of standard epoxy. Paint it onto the bonding area around FL18P and apply one layer BID. Stipple to wet out, apply 2nd layer BID and wet out. Apply peel-ply and stipple in place. Likewise paint starboard area, apply BID in 2 layers, wet out, and apply peel-ply. Had intended to use the FL18s assembled on the straight-edge to hold the layup in place, but since it's going to very fiddly to cut the peel-ply and polyethylene sheet for that, decide not to bother. The BID and peel-ply are conforming very well anyway, with no air pockets. 25C, 33% RH on fuselage floor. |
2168.0 |
| 7 |
[14:05] 24C, 31% RH on fuselage floor. Roll fuselage out onto drive. Remove peel-ply from yesterday's layups and file off glass whiskers along FL18 slots. Pull trailer forward, unpack to get at wings, roll port wing out and rig it. Move engine, roll out starboard wing and rig it. Put FL18 and straight-edge assembly into place. Thread nylon line through hinge holes with drilled screws and tension it. Check alignment of FL18s - room to spare for alignment in all directions. Remove nylon line. With wingtip wiggle help from Dorothy, remove pip-pins and pull out starboard wing a bit. Insert FL15 cross-tube and re-insert wing, engaging flap pin. Assemble FL16s onto FL18s. Hold FL16s in FL15 lugs and check side float with flaps up. Mark inner edge positions of FL18s on fuselage floor with fine felt-tip pen. Remove FL16s from FL18s. Degrease FL18 bonding areas with acetone. Mix 40g + 16g Araldite 420 (Redux) and add about 3 large doses of flox to make it really stiff. Inside fuselage, spread thinly onto FL18s and thickly onto fuselage floor. Slide FL18s on straight-edge into slots. Climb out and clean Redux off lower parts of FL18s. Thread nylon line through hinge holes with drilled screws and tension it. Adjust FL18 positions to get line central in hinge holes. Clamp 1 off 6.8 ohm 50W resistor to the lower part of each FL18, connect to bench power supplies and apply about 13V to 15V to get 2A flowing through each. As FL18s start to warm up, the Redux is flowing slightly and hole alignment is lost slightly, particularly on port side. Try sliding mixing sticks under FL18s to stop the sagging but that doesn't seem to do much good. Cut a piece of wood to about 350mm and prop up FL18P with that. Obviously now I can't get inside the fuselage to check temperature etc, as my weight will disturb the distance from FL18P to the ground. FL18S seems to be staying in alignment OK now. Reaching in from the side, the infra-red thermometer shows a max of about 50C in the area of each FL18 so that seems good. [18:05] Leave it to cook for a while, checking occasionally that alignment is still OK. [20:35] Although edges of Redux are still tacky, main body seems quite firm now, so should be safe to move things. Remove nylon line. De-rig wings and wheel away to trailer. Reload and close up trailer. Disconnect power supplies and roll fuselage back into garage. Re-connect power supplies. Couple car to trailer and back it up to its parking spot. Park cars. [21:40] |
2173.1 |
| 9 |
Nigel arrives to do some filming for his documentary project. Unclamp resistors from FL18s. Slice off protruding parts of nylon screws, and Redux extruded through forward FL18 holes, with razor blade. Drill through aft FL18 holes with 3.2mm bit in Tight-Fit drill kit. With some effort, remove straight-edge. Enlarge aft holes in stages to 4.8mm (Tight-Fit drill still jumping gears when asked to tackle large diameters in one go.) The head of the Tight-Fit drill is too large to get into the forward holes in FL18s, so carefully measure distance between forward and aft holes and mark that on underside of fuselage. Measure hole offset from hinge flange and mark that on forward hole positions. Drill 2.2mm at marked positions, check hole positions from top. Pilot holes didn't come out perfectly centred on holes in FL18s, but can be corrected by angling the larger drill slightly. Enlarge to 4.8mm while correcting positions. Check screw fit in all holes. File back Redux to clear screw heads etc inside and out. Check fit of AN970-3 washers and they need to be trimmed to fit for the outboard holes, adjacent to the hinge flanges. Hacksaw to D-shape and file smooth 4 off AN970-3 washers. Roll fuselage out onto drive for access to both sides, then realise there are only 7 off AN525-10R16 screws in the drawer instead of the 8 needed. The AN525-10R16 are almost threadbound, so check AN525-10R14 for length - they seem fine, at least on the starboard side. Threatening rain so roll fuselage back into garage and stop for a think about screw options. |
2175.7 |
| 12 |
Roll fuselage out onto drive. Check screw lengths in all holes of FL18s. Starboard outboard would be threadbound if AN525-10R16 used but all other positions are OK at that length. Dip 2 off AN525-10R14 in Duralac and fit them with trimmed AN970-3 washers to outboard holes in FL18S. The stickiness of the Duralac allows me to fit the AN960-10L washers and start the MS21042-3 stiffnuts on the threads - can't quite reach both ends of the screw at once. Propping a ring spanner on the nut, supported by a wedge and jammed against the baggage bay bulkhead, allows doing up the screw from the outside. Likewise fit AN525-10R16 screws in inboard holes of FL18S. Clean off excess Duralac with white spirit. In the same way, fit 4 off AN525-10R16 to FL18P, with trimmed washers on the outboard screws and everything coated in Duralac. One screw-head does not sit quite flat on the fuselage outer surface, so run the 4.8mm drill through again to square up the hole in the fuselage with the hole in FL18P. Clean up again with white spirit. Move FL15 into position in the fuselage slots and fit FL16s to FL18s. Pull trailer forward, clear out stuff obstructing wing access, wheel out port wing and rig it. Move engine, wheel out starboard wing and rig it. Quite easy to get flap pin onto end of FL15 with flaps extended. Clamp FL15 lugs to FL16s, lining up edges as well as possible. Can only fit wooden softening pieces to one side as the pilot holes need to be visible! Check that flaps are retracting fully on both sides. Drill through the 4 pilot holes 1/8" with tight-fit drill kit. (Tried the right-angle hex drive adaptor first but the hex-mounted 3mm drill bit didn't seem very sharp and the angle gearbox housing got too hot to hold quite quickly!) Enlarge each hole in small stages to 4.8mm, with some protests from Tight-Fit drill kit - will have to try re-building it with spacers to force the gears better into mesh. Unclamp FL15 lugs. De-rig wings and wheel back into trailer. Re-pack trailer and reverse it back into place with the car. Roll fuselage back into garage. |
2180.3 |
| 13 |
Turn on fan heater. Wipe down filled area between fuseholders on F14 instrument module with acetone-soaked tissue and spray matt black. Remove FL16s and mark port & starboard. Wipe down edges of slots and the lower parts of FL18s with acetone-soaked tissue. Mix 12.5g + 5g Araldite 420 (Redux) and add a good dose of flox to thicken it well. Spread around the edges of the slots for FL16s. Wipe off excess Redux. Spread some around the edge of the starboard forward wing socket where there was a slight gap and wipe off excess. Wipe off FL16s with acetone-soaked tissue and lay on newspaper, outboard side up. Spray a coat of Halfords appliance gloss white on them. Tape pieces of newspaper to underside of fuselage around FL18s. Spray FL18s one coat of white. Spray another coat of white on the FL16 outboard sides. Attach instrument module to firewall with greased 5/8" button-head screws. Substitute AN525-10R screws in various lengths to check what's needed in all locations. The bottom 4, going into the anchor nuts on aluminium brackets, need AN525-10R10. Likewise the extreme starboard one of the upper 8, and the 2 adjacent ones which fit from the aft side. For the remaining 5, AN525-10R14 seems to be just threadbound (although there seem to be 2 slightly different lengths of AN525-10R14, which is confusing - maybe some AN525-10R13 got mixed in) so AN525-10R12 should be just right. However, I have none of those in stock so add them to the pending orders list. Spray another coat of white on FL18s. Turn FL16s over and spray a coat of white on the inboard faces. Remove FL15 and spray white on a few spots where it had got rubbed off. Take foam kneeling blocks out of rear fuselage and remove swarf. Cut the 1/2" bolts that I've been using as temporary spar pins to 85mm long (matching starboard spar pin) and grind tapers on ends. Vacuum out all swarf from rear fuselage. Replace foam kneelers and unscrew all bolts from W35 gusset plates. Lay the plates on newspaper marked with orientation (PU, PL, SL, SU) and for each in turn clean up using wire brush wheel on polishing spindle. Degrease them all with acetone. Stir the Hammerite anti-rust primer well and brush one coat on the inner face of each plate. About 3 hours later, lift FL16s off newspaper but paint has seeped underneath and bits of paper are stuck to them. Trying to peel off the paper results in white paint & green primer coming off right back to the aluminium in places. Will have to strip it off and re-do. Brush another coat of Hammerite primer on inner faces of the W35 gusset plates. |
2185.4 |
| 14 |
After some internet research, find that Halfords do a different etch-primer to the one I've been using, which has attracted favourable reviews. None in stock at Cheltenham branch, so drive over to Gloucester and get several cans of U-Pol Acid #8 1K etch primer from that branch. Take the stool and the piece of plywood with the part-sprayed LG05 & LG07 reaction plates out to the carport. W35s stuck to newspaper so cut them off and scrape remains of paper off outer faces. Place on plywood, outer faces up, in same order (PU, PL, SL, SU) as before. Scrape bits of newspaper off outboard faces of FL16s and place, outboard face up, on plywood. Wipe everything off with acetone. Spray all fresh surfaces with U-Pol etch primer. After about 10 minutes, spray another coat. Rub down FL19/2 and FL21 with 600 grade emery and coarse steel wool. Degrease with acetone and hang on wires in carport. Spray with U-Pol etch primer. Spray another coat on the other pieces on the plywood. Get MW5 rod-end bearing and 175-601-208 fork assembly out of box 5 and fit them to the appropriate ends of FL20 with AN316-5R checknuts. As it's getting in the way a bit lying around, fit overhead panel with stainless button-head screws. Spray another coat of U-Pol etch primer on FL19 & FL21. Later, move plywood sheet with all sprayed parts back into garage. Using a tissue to avoid contamination, transfer FL19 & FL21 to wire hooks in the garage. However, looking at the manual, realise I should have chamfered the edge of FL19 before spraying. |
2187.9 |
| 16 |
Fit FL19/2 horn plate to LG08S retraction arm with plain nuts. Had to run 1/4" drill through FL19 holes to admit bolts. When lever is in the retracted position, FL19 barely touches LG01/3 landing gear frame and leaves no witness mark. Rub a small piece of 600 grade emery paper against edge of FL19, from both sides of LG01 to mark the location. Remove FL19 and file a chamfer at the spot with half-round files, coarse and fine. Wipe down FL19 with acetone-soaked tissue. Take FL19 & FL21 out to carport and suspend on wires. Spray them with U-Pol etch primer. Take stool out to carport. Take out plywood sheet with primed parts on it and place on stool. Spray all visible surfaces of parts with Appliance Gloss White. Set up a fan heater to warm up the spraying area and reduce humidity. After about 20 minutes, spray another coat of etch primer on FL19 & FL21, and another coat of white on other parts. Try inserting FL20 pushrod but can't get it to fit from either forward or aft ends. Take off fork and rod-end bearing, but that doesn't help much. Looks as though the fuel tap extension shaft might be preventing the pushrod rotating to fit better. Remove fuel selector top plate and knob. Remove 2 of the screws holding the valve but the 3rd is hard to reach. Finally get it out with a long ball-ended key passed through one of the escutcheon securing holes in the top of the tunnel. Spray another coat of white on FL19 & FL21. Detach the fuel lines from the bottom of the valve and cap the lines and the valve ports. Drop valve out and try re-inserting pushrod, but it still won't go! Spray a 2nd coat of white on FL19 & FL21. Later, after a break, spray another coat of white on FL19 & FL21. After another break, bring all sprayed items back into garage. Post message on Matronics Europa e-mail list about the pushrod problem. |
2191.0 |
| 17 |
Take stool and plywood sheet with sprayed parts out to carport. Turn all parts over and spray a coat of gloss white. Also FL16s which need touching up in a few spots. Get XSF02A bulkhead (serial XS286) and F08 D-panel out of trailer. Mark 7 hole positions on edge of D-panel, checking that they will not be too near the edges of the bulkhead flange. File flange locally for better fit. The forward flange of the bulkhead is quite long and the lower part is quite rippled and has fewer plies of pre-preg. Trim off all wrinkly area, leaving about 40mm flange with good surface. Spray another coat of white on the assorted parts on the ply sheet. Clamp D-panel to bulkhead and drill through marked holes, first 2.2mm then 4.8mm. Fit anchor nuts the bulkhead flange with short temporary screws and spacing nuts. Drill through rivet holes from aft face. Countersink forward face of rivet holes with 5.2mm drill bit. Set rivets using spacer as usual to keep nose of riveter clear of temporary screws. Remove the temporary screws. Offer up bulkhead to rear of cockpit module. Cables and conduit both sides prevent it going fully aft; needs about another 80mm movement aft for flange of bulkhead to fit against cockpit module rear well. Get out sheet 2 of the 3mm ply - can easily get both access hole covers out of that. Mark out and cut the access hole covers, rounding the corners to fit with a Perma-Grit block and marking for orientation. Leave bulkhead and D-panel in garage. |
2194.5 |
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