Not Much

The sheep are back in the fields so summer is ending. Allen will soon return so the last couple of weekends I have are devoted to getting some things straight in the hangar. I’m bummed that I haven’t gotten done the things I thought I might but that’s just the nature of this gig. It seems.

So what did I do? Routed wires, put some connectors on, that kind of thing. And then this chain of thought.

The control stick is not yet installed with a nut on the bolt. To do that I really want to sit in the plane to know where to install the stick’s neutral position. So to do that I need the seats in. I also need the arm rests out to get at the stick – watch those brake lines with those sharp edges! So, where it looked not long ago that the interior was almost done, now it is back to hardly anything.

Arm rests removed
(why haven’t I riveted the seatbelt bracket?)

So with the arm rests out I had another go at the seat bases.

Seat bases again

The passenger side almost fits but the pilot side is a dead loss. The plane needs to be about 1/8″ wider. A little forum reading reveals this is not uncommon (ok, so at least three other people found this to be the case) and the conventional wisdom is to cut the flanges off the seat bases, trim to fit and then use L-angles to give the edge support. I have a plan.

The flaperons still need to be installed so that they are straight and level but before that they need to be wrapped so I removed them as well.

Flaperons removed

I thought I would get a good start on that this weekend but it wasn’t to be so I consoled myself with wrapping the passenger side flaperon brackets.

Brackets wrapped

One more weekend, then Teri and I are off to the UK for a week and a bit – if anyone wants the hangar key to finish up, let me know! Then I’m back and hopefully the temperatures will have fallen and a full day’s work can be accomplished. Get this thing closer to finished.