My replacement firewall arrived - 1 hour

Well...my third replacement firewall arrived. You know the one that I wanted perfect!

UPS had other ideas of what it should look like. Despite the many stickers indicating fragile it was obviously placed on the bottom of a big box. I pulled the firewall out of the box (which vans did really well) and it was bent all over the place.

The flange one the bottom was particularly bad.

I tried my best to straighten it. But the result is that it then bows the firewall.

The only way to fix that is to flute the flange.
 
Well that's an ok fix. But then I tried to take out the rather large dents in the face of the firewall, and its just not happening. I compared the firewall #2 to this firewall #3 and the #2 is in much better shape. Looks like I completely wasted my money on scrap stainless steel.

Started in working on the 2nd firewall - 3 hours

After much delay, I decided I better get going on the plane. I've let many excuses creep in and stop me building. The cold weather is one excuse for sure as I really like to build with the garage door open and the sun pouring in, and this has been a very cold spring.

My firewall situation isn't sitting well with me. I've repaired the stainless steel as best I can and refinished it, as well as I tried to take some of the small dents out. But I still want a perfect firewall (The firewall is cheap, but the exchange rate and shipping isn't) a $114US firewall is about $300CDN landed to my door. I ended up ordering a new firewall (my third now) as I want it perfect!.

No reason why I can get started on on firewall parts. Specifically I fabricated the F-601P spacers and the F-601J angles. I also cleaned up the edges on all of the other firewall pieces


I'm really happy with how these F-601J angles have turned out.

Trying to repair the firewall - 3 hours

I've spent about 3 hours working on the firewall trying to get the scratches out. The scratches end up being on the interior side of the bulkhead and fairly close to where the angles get riveted on, so they are not absolutely horrible.

I used everything under the sun to get the scratches out. Primary, I used maroon and white 3M scotchbrite with toothpaste to remove and "re-polish" the firewall.


Its much better than it was. But some of those scratches weight heavy on my mind. How demoralizing for the build!

Ordered new firewall parts

Well...Its been an incredibly long time before I could order a new firewall. The economy here is taking a beating and although we are very busy at work, they is no opportunity at this time for bonus so saving money has been a slow process. Add to the fact that we are now in lockdown because of Covid...I think that I will have extra time on my hands to get building.

 I finally managed to order the firewall but the box showed up to my door looking like its been through a war. I can't believe my eyes.



It would appear that customs may have opened the box and only used tape to put the lid back on. I opened up the box and my parts are just thrown on top of each other. The new left luggage floor was just thrown on top of the firewall which is now crushed and there are scratches all over the firewall and there are some dimples where the brake mounting bracket is.




I am so pissed off.

I went to work on the luggage floor, and after about 30 minutes, I was able to fix the flange as best I could. I'm not too worried about it as my luggage floors are removable and can easily be replaced at any time.


The firewall is another story. Some of those scratches seem deep.

Completed my first night solo flight

So I have been working on my night endorsement this winter. Tonight was my fist solo PIC in command. Logged a 0.6. I really enjoy flying at night!

Inspecting the firewall - 2 hours

Now that I've had time to let things sit and I can now really look at things. I'm really becoming uncomfortable with how the firewall looks. When you really look at it, since that sealant is soo thick, I fear that I do not have a good solid mechanical connection between the pieces.

After much swearing, looking, head scratching. I decided to drill out this connection to get a better look. It ends up to look much worse than it really is. Where the parts actually mate, the sealant is very thin. however, by drilling/punching all the rivets out I'm quite concerned that the rivet holes are too opened up/sloppy.

Being this is a major connection/stress point for the engine. I've made the difficult decision to abandon this fire wall. I will have to order a whole new firewall, but it isn't cheap and I have no money for new parts right now.

This build is put on hold for a while.     

Replacing rivets in the firewall - 8 hours

In the craziness of yesterday, some of the rivets need to be redone. drilling the heads off is easy enough. But I am dreading punching them out of such thick material. So... I cut a piece of oak that and fashioned it so that it would support the firewall when I drove the rivets out of the firewall.

This actually turned out to be an incredibly good tool. This gets placed under the firewall assembly and the rivet head gets placed inside the "notch". It then is able to support the area as you punch out the rivet.

I use some oak blocks under the firewall to support the 3 corners that I am not punching the rivets out on.



All done