29th September 2014 - Wheels and brakes complete

Once all the masking paper was removed from the fuselage the first job inside was to re-install the strobe power pack. This is behind the back of the baggage compartment so needs to be in place before the interior can be refitted.
Next the spat attach brackets and spacers were removed, degreased, primed, and top coated. Once dry they were re-installed and the brakes refitted and the bolts wire-wrapped.
Then using a simple pressure system the brakes were filled with fluid from the bleed nipples. By filling from the bottom up there should be no possibility of airlocks.
Both brake peddles seem completely solid with no evidence of any air in the system so that seems to have worked.
It is great to be putting things together into their final state. Unfortunately the next job is to replace the radio in the panel. EASA have decided that all new aircraft registered now can only have  8.33MHz capable radios fitted. So my Garmin/Apollo SL30 will have to be replaced with a different unit.

18th - 28th September 2014 - Painting the fuselage

We have had a spell of calm dry warm weather so this has provided the opportunity to finish paint the fuselage.
First a coat of smoke grey EkoPrime was sprayed onto the fuselage and rubbed down with 320 grade open coat sandpaper. Then over three days the top and fin, the bottom and the two sides were gloss-coated with Insignia White EkoPoly.
As I'm doing all the painting myself and don't have any sort of paint shop available the spraying was done outside. As always a range of small insects embed themselves in the paint before it dries but these can be polished out once the paint is fully hardened without leaving too much damage.
Overall, I'm reasonably pleased with the finish I have been able to achieve. It isn't professional quality but it is more than acceptable and I have the satisfaction of knowing that I have done everything on this build myself.
With the painting complete I can now remove all the masking and start to put the aircraft back together.

16th September 2014 - No longer baffled except for one thing!

The baffle material was riveted into place and the the edges rounded. In the four places where the sections of baffles meet the overlap in the material was screwed together rather than riveted to allow the sections to be removed. The inter-cylinder baffles were fitted and tie rods threaded to pull the under sections of the cylinder baffles together. Vans supply stainless steel rod for the tie rods and assume you will have a 6-32 die cutter to hand. Holes were cut in the rear baffles to mount the plates through which the plug wires will pass
The idea of the baffles is that the air flowing in through the ducts in the cowl is forced between and round the cylinders ensuring even cooling. The flaps in front of the no. 1 and no. 2 cylinders try to balance the cooling front to back.
Once all this was finished the top cowl was fit into place when my mistake was revealed. My perfectly placed Oil filler flap was on the wrong side of the rear baffle. It provided access to the rear cylinder and nothing else!
Luckily mistakes in fibreglass are reasonably easy to correct. The section of the cowl around the door was cut out as a rectangle together with a  similar sized section behind it. The rectangular piece was then cut in half so that I had a piece with the door and its surround and a second blank piece.
With the cowl fastened to the bench with some plastic sheet below it, the two pieces were then glassed back into the cowl in the reverse direction. A bit of filler made good the joints. Then a coat of primer was applied to the whole top cowl to reveal the inevitable pinholes in the fibreglass. A mixture of micro-balloons and resin is used to fill the pinholes. The picture shows it prior to final sanding. This is a mind-numbing job so I'll be doing it a bit at a time as motivation occurs.

14th September 2014 - Baffled by baffles: day 4

Once the spacing to the cowl was checked and rechecked the final cut of the baffles was made and the edges smoothed and deburred. The second picture, taken through the oil filler door shows how the front section follows the line of the cowl with the 1/2" spacing. Then a start was made on cutting and fitting the baffle material before darkness stopped work.

30th August 2014 - Baffled by baffles: day 3

Day 3 of the baffle construction saw the basic structure completed. The left front baffle was completed and the centre section of the right front baffle extended. Balanced on the top of cylinder 1 you can see the spacer I "printed" to fit on a Sharpie pen which I used to mark a cut line around the top of the baffle to provide the 1/2" clearance to the cowl.

28th August 2014 - Baffled by baffles: day 2

I'm behind on the blogs but work has continued. On the 28th I spent another day on the baffles. The right rear baffle was riveted together and then work started on the right front baffle where it passes behind the flywheel.
As before the kit from Vans needed significant modification to fit my O-235-C2C engine. However, using the kit has made it much easier than starting from scratch. As can be seen the panel that extends along the side of the flywheel is not long enough so this will need an extension riveting into place. This is because the Tailwind cowl requires a 4" prop extension unlike the Vans cowl..
A first cut of the top of the baffles was made to allow the cowl to be fitted into place. This was done by repeatedly cutting and then test fitting the cowl until it would just sit in place. Eventually the baffles will be trimmed to leave a 1/2" gap to the cowl which will be filled with the flexible rubber baffle material.