Pushing On & Partial Move

Pushing on!

Congratulations to me on becoming a Hyatt Globalist this year! Unfortunately that means I've been on a lot of work travel over the last few years, which adversely affects the time I've had to work on the project.  Sad to say it's been 3-months since I completed a major evolution, however when I'm in town I try to continue pushing forward, racking up some hours and getting closer to the proverbial finish line.  Most everything in terms of time is going in the 'finishing' section because I made the assumption that interior, avionics, AC and such are 'finishing' type items.

As I await the engine to be assembled, tested and crated for me to pickup (Hopefully this week) I've been working through some other tasks over the last few months-

• Panel Revisions - Last January I had a panel design that I really liked.  In the end though I decided to try and simplify it as much as possible and am currently working with SteinAir on finalizing the layout.  The equipment has stayed the same for the most part but I removed my overly complicated Mag switch and starting sequence and decided to go with the standard ACS style key and starter.  I also removed the AP Power switch given that there are several ways already to turn off the AP if there are issues.  Lastly where I thought I was going to have the light switches, in the end they won't fit so those will move down.  Still in the process but looks more like this now-

• Electrical Drawing - Also last January based on my anticipated equipment and configuration I put together a very detailed power distribution drawing along with a Visio book containing all sorts of other documentation. Have been working on this, I've gone back and forth between some ideas but again to try and simplify things as much as possible with still providing a good level of redundancy, I've made changes.  I'm still thinking dual battery (One being an IBBS), dual alternator and if all else fails the Garmin G5 with it's own backup battery.  The G5 also acts as a backup ADAHRS.  Between all these, if I'm in IFR and things start going south I should have enough redundancy to get me out of the clouds and someplace safe to land.
• Interior Panels - I started receiving my order from Aerosport a number of weeks ago. I have some experience working with plane plastics so I'm somewhat comfortable working with them.  My process is get everything fit and installed.  Then I'll go back through and remove everything, refinish it and when able reinstall the parts.  Some parts such as the rear panels can really go back in immediately, where the forward kick panels can't be installed again until after Avionics and wiring is all finished up. Here are a few pictures of the fitting process-

Partial Move

My 3-car Aeroplane factory is getting a bit crowded again.  With the engine coming I decided to go ahead and move the wings and the horizontal stab to the Hangar. This frees up the shelving above my garage to store some parts and clears out a bit space where the 15' long wings resided. Several things had to happen for me to do this.

First off my hangar was a bit of a mess.  On one side there was all sorts of odds and ends from our 172 restoration project. On the other side there was a grave yard of old broken ripped out parts from an A&P we once used.  I've tried for years to get him to get the stuff and decided to finally just trash it. I also wanted to move one of my long workbenches, a tool chest and some other things to start prepping an area to final assembly the project.  After about 6 hours I had cleaned it up, celebrated with an hour long flight in the 172 and then snapped a picture before putting the plane back.

Moving the wings was a bit more of an ordeal.  I rented a 17' box truck with the intent in rolling the wings up the ramp and strapping them down.  A friend of mine came over to help and I'm glad he did.  The ramp was about 1/2" too narrow... or I guess maybe I mounted the wheels a 1/2" too wide.  Either way, him and I had to lift the wings and cradle into the back of the box truck.  Once strapped down there was about 1" clearance between the end of the cradle and the door.  Happy to say the wings made the 20 mile trip with no issues and they now live at the Airport.