Twisted: Week 162 - Canopy Part 5

Hours to date: 1433.5

Sorry for the big gap in posts but I have had my parents over visiting from New Zealand, so things have been rather hectic for me.

Onto the canopy.

The opening and emergency release mechanisms are both completely finished.

As you can see below I decided to paint the emergency handle red - I think it helps with other pilots who don't know the aircraft not to pull on it - it will of course be placarded also.

On the emergency release side I struggled to drill the hole for the roll pin that secures the handle in place. The release pin is made from stainless steel which is notoriously difficult to drill. I only have a hand drill (a drill press is much better) and even though I bought some Cobalt drill bits they didn't work. I then bought a Carbide drill bit and I made some progress with it before I work hardened the steel. Feeling a bit frustrated by this point I ended up taking it to a local engineering shop and getting them to drill it and fit the roll pin. It is one of the very few jobs I have not done myself on the kit so far. (I actually fitted two roll pins - one either end of the handle - just to be sure).

Once the handle was painted I fitted the release pin back into the fuse and bonded it in place with carbon and flock (this was only on the fibreglass tube section that the pin slides in).

After that I flocked the panel that had been cut out of the side of the cell back in place and then put one layer of glass over all the joins with a 50mm overlap.

On the opening side I have painted the metal parts black - and left the parts that slide into the mechanism bare (they are stainless so will not corrode).

Everything works well - the opening is easy, with no play and the emergency release has a nice hard 'pull' to it which is what I wanted. Use WD40 to lubricate these mechanisms but only after they have been bonded and painted.

The only thing left to do is bond the canopy perspex to the frame - I have spent many hours so far fitting it to the frame. Still a little more to do. I have used a hand sanding method as I don't like the idea of putting a power tool on the perspex. Pete says he uses an 80 grit flexible sanding disc on an angle grinder. I don't have an angle grinder so I am resorting to the 'armstrong' method of hand sanding.

I am finding that the more you do the more you have to do (if that makes sense) as the canopy settles onto the frame. It's not a job you would ever do in one hit - best to have several sessions of it, taking a little off each time as you go.

An update on the frame fitting to fuselage. I thought I had added plenty of micro to the fuse before putting the frame on - and indeed it did ooze out of the sides all round on the outside - but as it turns out I did not add enough on the inside area. Not a major hassle as I just had to have 2 goes at doing this job. Adding more micro to the fuse and giving the frame another wax on the packing tape before closing it down. With the waxed packing tape it released very easily.

I've moved onto the dreaded flap drive job now (which Pete says is the worst job on the whole kit) so will post an update on that soon.