28-05 fuel line, cut off valve to gascolator

Lots of tube bending and unbending and gently (or not so gently) nudging the line into the desired place.  The technical aspect of using the tube cutter, flaring tool and bending tool are pretty easy.  My ability to visualize the spacial gaps and correctly bend the tube to achieve the desired alignment is not so good.  Oddly, I recall taking an Air Force placement/aptitude exam when I was in my early 20’s and being somewhat surprised at a low score in spacial relationships based on paper representations.  I think that that’s what’s going on here.  Oh, well.  Regardless of my intrinsic weaknesses, I believe that i have safe & functional fuel lines installed, even if they are not pretty or elegant from an engineering point of view.

 

Fuel line from cutoff valve to bulkhead

Fuel Line inside cockpit Tunnel

Note the Red Box fuel flow sensor.  The white wiring will communicate from the sensor to the aircraft avionics, but for now may be ignored.   The fore most line goes from the fuel flow sensor to the gascolator.  Recall that I had to use a  step drill through the aluminum stiffener that you see along the far right inside edge of the tunnel.  Apparently, I didn’t get the measurement exactly right (or the drill wandered a bit before biting in and drilling) and the nipple didn’t fit through the hole and into the cascolator as originally placed.  I used a Dremel tool and shaved the edge of the hole until it was more of an oval and the nipple was able to fit through the firewall.   

Gascolator installed on firewall

 

Here’s the installed gascolator.  You can see the safety wire installed.  That took over an hour to get the wire threaded through the 4 screws and tight enough to be effective.   More to follow...