Got my firewall forward kit today - the final sub-kit from TAF!  Still have other things to order though, like the engine, propeller and parachute....

I think the panel shipped out today from Stein Air.

Took a peak in the box. ;-)

Another thing that arrived today was the material I ordered to use as a gasket for the luggage door.  This is 1/16" thick neoprene foam (not rubber) that I think will work well.

1 hr. on center fuselage longerons.

It was noticed by other builders that longeron 303 (short piece reaching to the luggage door on the left side) didn't reach far enough forward to cover the two rivet holes.  They fashioned new parts to reach, but I didn't discover this until it was already installed, so a different solution is required.

I decided to make a bridge piece that will span 2 holes of the center fuselage longeron and 2 holes of 303.  This is the part I made, which will fit under the longerons.

Part goes here.

Held in place to drill some holes.

For now I'm just going to rivet the forward-most hole.  I'll wait until the side skin is on so that the rear holes can be properly lined up and drilled.

It was recommended by other builders to rivet these 2 lower longerons now, before the skin is on.  Definitely easy to rivet without the skin on.

And the other side done.

1 hr. misc.

The one and only item my Tech counselor cited for fixing was the two inner rivets shown here (and on the other side) which weren't seated flat.  These were near impossible to rivet at all due to the various overhanging flanges.  I think it would be very difficult to drill those out cleanly and do any better riveting them so I decided to instead supplement those rivets with another larger rivet in the middle of the 4.

...Like this.  I'm happy with that.

I wanted to insulate these vertical surfaces since there's no insulation from here back to the rear fuselage.  I don't want my rear seat passengers to be cold, so....

...I put in insulation on all the vertical sections.  I feel warmer already. ;-)

1 hr. on luggage door strike plate and center console area.

Got my power supply for powering my panel.  This is what I got.  SteinAir says the panel currently draws less than 6A, so this 10A should be just fine.  Can't wait!

Had to widen the holes in order to get the screws into the rivnuts.

With the back cover on.  Need to adjust the hole in the lower left, but other than that it works well.

Pilot holes in the new luggage door lock strike plate.

With several layers of material that the rivets have to go through, it was pretty marginal whether the rivet was long enough.  I figured by countersinking the holes here they would have something to grab on to.  Did it work?

Perfect!  That baby isn't going anywhere.  I'll hold off a bit on fixing the latch of the lock until I have some gasket material in place around the edge of the door.  Want a nice and tight fit.

2 hrs. misc.

Ordered some heavier angle material.  6' of 1 x 1 x .062 and 2' of 3/4 x 3/4 x .062.

The 3/4" material I'll use for making a new, more robust, strike plate for the luggage door lock as some other builders have done.  Drilled out 4 rivets in prep.  There are multiple layers of material and I didn't have an appropriately long and skinny marking instrument to mark off where the holes in the strike plate will go, so I put the rest of this install off for another day.

Since I got new mandrels for my rivnut puller I figured I'd complete putting in the M4 rivnuts for the COM mounting plate.

Time to work on getting this piece done.  Putting an M4 rivnut behind that open hole, so I put some screws into the sides to make sure it's positioned properly.

Some duct tape to catch the filings and I drilled out the hole to fit an M4 rivnut.

Two rivets in and the rivnut installed.

Now to work on the two holes at the front of the piece.  Those holes will have to be widened a bit to line up with the M4 rivnuts in the center console.  To be continued tomorrow...

1 hr. on the center console area.

I've had a cold the last few days so it's been hard to muster the energy to work on the plane...  But, I managed an hour today.  I have tomorrow off so hopefully can do a few hours tomorrow.

Received my replacement mandrels for my rivnut puller.  Now I can finish off the antenna mount.  Also got my Contego fireproof coating.  But first I'll need to properly prep the galvanized firewall to accept paint.  That's for another day though...

This piece is too long to fit here...

Of course I realized soon after that the back panel of the center console goes over the piece, but it still needed some banging down to get it to fit.

I had to remove some material over the rivnuts in order to get screws in there.  Doesn't matter that it's not perfect because it gets covered by the panel.  Hope to finish off this area tomorrow.

1 hr. on the luggage door lock and starting on the piece behind the center console.

The hole needs some filing for the lock to fit through.

Hmm, the supplied washer won't fit as-is...

Hammered down the spikes on the washer and clipped off one side (note that there's an orientation to the washer, so you can't just clip any random side).

I'll be modifying the latch itself because I'm going to fabricate a new strike plate like other builders have done.  The material is on order, so I'll get back to this in a few days.

This piece will need to be shortened a bit to fit.  I'll want to make sure I shorten it in such as way that the holes line up with the rivnuts in the underlying piece.

3 hrs. on the back seat support brackets and luggage door.

Right side riveted in place.  I'm holding off on riveting it to the rib until I know how the interior skins fit here.

Left side.

Had to file down the hinges tab on the side that fits in the fuselage to get it to fit.

First test fit.

Seemed to get the best fit required the door to be a bit up and against the hinge on the left side.

Right side there was a gap to the hinge end.

Even with that it was a tight fit on the left side.

Taped it down to start the drilling and reaming process.

 After drilling and reaming the holes it was time to check again.

Looked good, so I riveted the hinge to the door.

Before riveting it to the fuselage you have to bend the door to match the curvature of the fuselage.

Here's what I had to bend to.

First attempt at bending...  Didn't work well.  The door is very thick...  I'm going to need more leverage.

This worked way better.

Bending...  Pretty hard pulling required..

Getting better...

Kept bending it at various points, higher, lower...  Lots of back-and-forth with checking and bending.

The final bending at the top edge was more easily done using this tool.

Perfecto!  Should be even better once I get some thin rubber gasket to go around the edge on the inside.

Now it's ready to be attached to the fuselage.  Taped in place.  Drilled, reamed and cleco'ed from the center out.  Then I took all the parts out and deburred all the layers and cleaned out all the debris.

Riveted in place and looking good!

Two bends...

Good enough for government work. ;-)

The instructions don't tell you how to install the parts...  Some of this I can figure out, but I don't want to damage the wrong part with the washer that has sharp prongs on it.  So, internet friends, how are these assembled?