My Dad left to go home to England, next time he comes back the plane will be done!!! Well, seriously it better be.
Allen offered to come help me carry on with the doors and in the meantime I had bought a cutoff wheel for cutting the doors. Except I had bought the wrong size (twice!), Allen showed up with the right one. In the end, Allen used his fancy belt sanding tool to trim the doors.
They have a nice fit up against the cabin frame but as Allen pointed out later, they need to be further trimmed to match the lower part of the windshield.
From here we spent what must have been an hour trying to work out how the door locking mechanism works. It sure wasn’t easy visualising it from the plans or the photo guide. Eventually we determined that it didn’t matter too much where the handle went (within a small area) so we eyeballed the best position and used a step bit to drill the hole.
With the handle held in place, I drew around the edge so that I could determine the location of the mounting screws.
I was happy (and astounded) that the holes matched the ones on the door frame and we got a nice snug fit on the door.
Here’s the inside, showing the indoor latch making contact with the striker plate.
The second one went the same way and although if you’ve seen one door, you’ve seen them all, here are the exterior and interior shots.
Finally I drilled all the door hinge rivet holes to their final size, 30.
Next up will be to install the system of rods that aim to keep the door shut in flight.