Partial Paint applied

 

I was planning on working in the hanger on the nose fairing when i got a call from Chris asking if I could come up to AV8 Paintworks and look at the plane and refine the scheme.  As luck would have it, that was the only day in a long time that I was able to do that.  Up to Marion!

Chris expressed some concern about my original sketch.  I was totally OK with that, as I am not an artist and that was merely a quick idea.  If you look at the photo below, you can see a blue line along the fuselage and tail. That was my original sketch.  Chris felt that the upsweep on the tail was counter to the idea of making the plane look like it’s flying.  He got out the yellow tape and we spent about an hour mocking up placements.  The photo below is the final result (rough placement only.). Red will go above the blue/yellow line and encapsulate the cockpit & canopy area.  The next region back will remain beige and sweep from above the wing and over the back. There will be another band of red on the back the reaches to the tail.  The leading edges of all flying surfaces will be red and sweep back.

 

Tape for layout of accent colors

 

The next photo shows he beige and red.  Chris said that they still aren’t ‘finished’ as there is no polishing yet.   I just put the spinner on the horizontal stab so I could see the colors.

Color!

 

 The last photo is just to show one of the preparation phases.  The upper cowling is all red, so Chris hasn’t painted it yet.  He did want to put it on the plane for helping visualize the layout, so I just grabbed a photo.  The texture is totally different from the raw fiberglass—I don’t know if it makes sense to say “palpable matte surface”, but that’s what I’m going with. 

prepped but not painted upper cowl

 

 

paint going on

Just received an “in progress” photo from the painter.  he’s got the fuselage painted in the main beige.  You can see a flat grey appearance on the turtle deck. That will become red in the next few days or so.

 

Glossy Paint!

prep & tape

Chris sent me a few photos now that he’s gotten started.  (There were a few weeks around Christmas when he was still getting his new paint shop operational.). 

 

 

 

HI David. 90% of the aluminum prep is done. You can see the difference between the virgin aluminum and what has been treated. This process provides mechanical adhesion that along with the chemical bond will provide the best possible bond for your paint job. 

 

Progress will go quickly from here out. Prep is the time consuming part.

 

He’s planning on shooting on the primer, and then the base coat (beige) and having me come up to look at sketches and do detail decisions on where to place the red (predominately on the leading edges) and black accent paint.

36-07 Main Wheel Pants

Although it was too late to have them delivered with the rest of the plane, I’m continuing to work on the wheel pants.  I finally finished up the main pants by drilling and installing the 9 nut plates (each) on the rear halves.  When I’m finished with the nose wheel pant, I’ll deliver those up to Chris.  he said he could paint them in a few days.

Main Wheel Pants

delivery for painting!

So, what’s the first thing you do when you get your airplane back together?  In my case, I promptly flew it to AV8 Paintworks in Marion (KMNN) and spent 2 hours taking it apart again.  Cowling, spinner, tail cowling, rudder, flaperons, inspection plates—all off.  I got the control cables disconnected for the horizontal stab and Chris (painter, pictured below) commented that he could paint the tail with the Stab in place, so I didn’t have to remove that. (Good news; I was glad because it’s a royal pain to install.  Bad news: i had already disconnected the cables, and will need to pull the bulkhead to re-tension them when I get it back together.)

Looks like he’s wiping a tear of joy at having a project to work on!

 

She’s all taken apart again, but will look better than ever in a few weeks!

1st Annual Condition Inspection

This is somewhat late (and actually post dated).   I finally finished the annual inspection!  I hired Shane, of Shamrock Aviation, to do the engine inspection as he has the professional expertise and tools.  He had a fairly short squawk list that was easy to take care of.  He said that the engine installation looked good, and that I should have a happy relationship with it.  As is the case with darn near every phase of this project, the rest of the inspection took much longer than I anticipated.  You may have read that I have paralysis by analysis when I have too much on my plate at any one time, and this was no exception.  I finally got things in gear and finished up on 12/28/16, nearly 6 weeks after I started.

The only significant find I came across was evidence of a small leak at the fuel cutoff valve.  I was able to tighten the fittings without any trouble, and I think that they were a bit loose as these were the first flared fittings i had ever done.

 

fuel leak at shut off valve.

 

all taken apart :(

 

on sawhorses for wheel checks

 

I got things buttoned up the week before Christmas.  It was a bit cold and icy on the ramp.  When I applied power to the warmed engine to try to balance the carbs, I started to slide on the ice.  In my fear driven state, I must have really punched the brakes, as the L brake line suddenly went soft and bottomed out.  By the time I had the power back to idle (almost instantaneous) and the ignitions killed (about  1 or 2 eternities later) and the plane stopped without hitting anything, I instinctively must have pumped the L brake 3 or 4 times before I realized what that meant.  Sure enough, got back in the hangar and there’s a puddle of brake fluid dripping on the floor.  It took 2 days to clean that up.  I tried reproducing my Rube Goldberg nozzle & fill system, then borrowed a vacuum brake bleeder that is meant for car systems before I finally borrowed a pressurized brake bleeder system (meant for airplanes) from Shane.  (I try to avoid relying on him for tools and expertise, but since I’m currently one of his top customers with N7623V, he had no problem lending me the brake filler.) 

blew a brake line!

 

missing rivet!

On 12/28, I mechanically balanced the carbs (foregoing the pneumatic sync for now) and returned to the air.  I flew 3 touch & goes, then headed over to Marion to deliver the plane to AV8 Paintworks for painting!

 

 

The following Service Bulletins were verified as completed and/or accomplished during kit assembly:  SA 3-17-11 by inspection on 11/20/2014; SB 04-02-01 NA by shipping date, SB 10-03-17 during kit assembly 4/4/15; SB 10-04-28 NA by shipping date; SB 10-12-14 superseded by SB 16-05-23; SB 11-09-13 by inspection 4/17/16; SB 11-12-14 NA by shipping date; SB 12-01-30 NA by shipping date; SB 12-8-09 NA by shipping date; SB 12-09-26 superseded but SB 12-11-09; SB 12-11-09 NA by shipping date; SB 13-02-06 NA by shipping date; SB 13-03-21 informational only; SB 13-04-05 NA by shipping date; SB 13-08-29 NA by shipping date; SB 13-12-12 NA by shipping date; SB 14-01-17 NA (SLSA only); SB 14-07-23 superseded by SB 14-09-10; SB 14-09-10 superseded by SB 14-12-16; SB 14-10-14 superseded by SB 15-03-15; SB 14-11-03 complied with by installation of doubler 6/4/15; SB 14-12-06 complied with by removal and replacement with improved F-1206 bearing bracket brace 6/11/15; SB 14-12-16 complied with by replacement of throttle return springs 4/4/15; SB 15-03-05 complied with by replacing carb floats 4/4/2015; SB 16-04-10 complied with by testing correct wiring of com radio 12/10/2016;SB 16-05-26 complied with by adding “USA” to data plate 12/10/16;

 

SB 16-04-23 complied with 12/10/16 by inspection with no cracks around/in WD-1230 nose fork, next due 12/31/17;   SB 16-08-01 complied with 12/10/16 by inspection and no looseness found in stabilator bearings, next due 12/31/17; SB 16-08-24 complied with 12/10/16 by inspection with no evidence of loose rivets on engine mount WD-1204, next due on 12/31/17.

 

I certify that this aircraft has been inspected on 12/28/2016 in accordance with CFR 14 part 43 appendix D and found to be in condition for safe operation.      TTAF 25 hrs, David B. Hill, RLSA 3132802 

 

 

carbon fiber panel

the same guy who’s going to paint the plane also does a lot of fiberglass and carbon panel work.  I really didn’t like the flat black spray paint job that I did back 2 years ago (1/5/15).  It was flaking badly and just looked like it would get worse.  As part of the annual inspection, I elected to pull the entire panel and deliver it to him for a cosmetic carbon panel overlay.  Getting the engine controls threaded back through the fire wall and onto the engine were the time consuming part of that project, but it does look much better!

 

cosmetic carbon fiber overlay on main panel