Month: September 2016

Keel penetrations

Landing light opening was cut out using jigsaw and sanded to contour with a flange that will later hold the landing light lens.  The landing light housing (pre-fab part) was cut to fit and sanded, and bonded into place with a mixture of structural epoxy, cabo, and flox.

The NLG access cover was sanded and duct tape was placed around the opening in the keel where the cover will go. The cover was then hot-glued into place, and layers of BID were applied to make a flange.  After curing, the flange was timed and edges sanded smooth.

The circular access hole for the NLG hydraulic cylinder was cut in the keel.  The center was displaced about 1.5″ forward and down from plans due to suggestion from Chad.  The keel outer skin was then cut back and additional 1/2″ with a rabbet router bit.  Foam was dug out in preparation for filling with micro and 2xBID around the edge of the hole.

Preparations

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Spent a weekend getting the workshop ready to begin fuselage work.  After months spent taking care of other problems around the house, traveling and writing proposals for work, I am finally ready to start working on the Velocity in earnest!

Spent time getting everything organized to make fiberglass layups, mounted the fiberglass cloth rolls in the rolling rack, along with some clear plastic for layups.  Organized the shelves with adhesives, hand tools, abrasives, etc.

Cleaned all of the old masking tape and tape adhesive goo from the inside and outside of the windows.  Hot glued some poly sheet around the windows to prevent scratching and dust accumulation.