Sunday, February 28, 2021

More fitting F-748 baggage tunnel cover and started flap assembly - 6 hours

 I noticed that the F-748 baggage tunnel cover needs to be fit with the baggage bulkhead panels installed. When I did this, the baggage tunnel cover fit wasn't great at all. Towards the aft, the very thin skin of the cover has quite a bow to it and a decent gap between it and the floor. I spent some time with it, uninstalling and reinstalling but nothing worked. 

After reading about it on other blogs, seems this a very common issue. It seems that others have simple re-bend the end of the piece and then oblong-ed the two aft mounting holes. Since this is not a structural part I see no reason to do the same.

I set up the piece in the vice and I will re-bend the end of F-748 about the thickness of a popsicle stick. Once clamped and set up, I used a rubber matter to re-shape the bend. Once the mounting holes were filed oblong. The cover mounted to the floor so much better.


Next I need to start in on the flap assembly. I need to fabricate F-767. The plans do not give you dimensions to work with so I imported the shape into AutoCAD. Drafted the part and then I could reproduce the part with the use of a template.



With F-767 fabricated and drilled to the F-766A cover. I am now able to back drill the top most holes in F-767.

With the rough fitment of the front flap assembly complete. I was ready to fabricate the F-785B. At this point I realized there was no need to dimple the two mounting holes in the baggage floor. Im not the only builder to have done this. (I could always dimple the two mounting holes in F-785B - It works...i've tried). but I chose to leave it for now. 

Since the band saw is set up, I began fitting the F-983A fuel valve plate and F-983C valve cover.


I trimmed the valve plate on the band saw and flipped it upside down.