Cabin Doors & Transparencies - Part 2

I have been traveling frequently for work which eats up entire weeks at a time.  In several cases weeks at a time.  My job makes this build possible, so maybe in an indirect way it's a building activity... All the travel has made the last few months of building sporadic, often ending up finding little things to do but not doing big needle moving changes... and I'm still on section 45... I did complete the initial glassing of the windshield fairing. It's extremely ugly right now but I wanted to wait until I get the doors on and latching before working the external cabin top.

Windshield Fairing peel ply'd

Working on the door latching I did a terrible job documenting the process.  It's actually a bit confusing because I'm using the some of the stock parts, the Aerosport flush mount handle and finally the PlaneAround 180 degree latch kit.  During the 15 or so hours I've spent on these it was broken up by numerous days and it was enough to juggle between the three different set of instructions figuring out what I need to do and when.

I'm also using cam locks by FortX vs the ACS locks that I think the handles were designed for.  So I had to do some trail and error engineering to get it to fit flush on the outside and function on the inside.  My end solution was to split a rubber grommet and shape it into a gasket that fit around the lock making it proud enough to line up flush with the glamour plate of the handle kit.  Again I didn't take any pictures of the process but you can see the end fit on a picture.

Working handles

Door slotted

Exterior handle, with lock

Interior handle, with lock

I still have quite a bit to do.  I am filling some time working on things like the tires, brakes, engine mount ect.  But will wait till those sections to post the pictures.  On the door it's mostly the inner workings and get them on the plane.  Hope to have that done in the next week or so, before I go out of town again.

Cabin Doors & Transparencies - Part 1

Section 45

If you've done it yourself or have followed anyone's build you'll know that the doors are a dreaded step in the build.  I'm about 50 some odd hours into section 45 and probably have a good 50-100 hours to go till completion.  Need a bit of attention to detail to work through the section and should ask questions if you have any. Mess ups not might not come around till later and then you will end up having to back track.

I'm moving a bit out of order in this section.  For example where I'm sitting right now is preparing to glass in the windshield.  Per the plans this is typically done post door finalization, however waiting on some after market parts to do the door functioning mechanisms. It's a non issue but wanted to throw that out before I continue through this. Also will probably be more pictures than writing, you spend a lot of time on small parts of the plans.

Cabin Doors

This jist of the doors is you take the parts Vans sends you, rough cut and line up to a series of index holes.  Not my index holes were a bit off so as long as you can get the front and the back to line up it all works out.  After initial trimming and test fitting I added some insulation and then glued them together.

Free Child Labor

Free Adult Labor

Ready for some brackets and then glue

More kid labor

Insulation before glue, didn't install where door mechanism will go.

Parabeam material from Vans.  Interesting stuff

My middle kid was a huge help on gluing the door halves together.  She walked into the garage at the wrong time and I quickly recruited her.  I used a mess of tape to hold these things in place, checking and triple checking.  At this point if they are way off then you're pretty much going to start over with a new set.

 After epoxy cures you can then remove and trim up.  After I could get them to set in the door cabin recess I made new brackets to hold them in place aligned with the index tabs.  These were used to align and get the door hinges together.

Typical to using the McMaster door seal is the modification of closing off the door hinge gap as well as using nutplates.  Here are pictures of that activity.

Transparencies

In between some things I got working on the transparencies, this includes the windscreen fit, rear and door windows. I also painted the glare shield which I plan to cover at some point also.  I went ahead and touched up the center brace since it got scratched fitting the wind screen.  I used Lord Adhesive to attach all transparencies and am now in the process of taping out and finishing up the outside of these to make them look good.  Also have prepped the windscreen area for all the layups and filler on that.

Final Fit Windshield

Current State, oh I put the engine mount on too...

The above picture shows the planes current progress.  I have a lot to do and just for reference here's a quick checklist to finish this section.

• Install Aerosport door handle and PlaneAround latch system.
• Get final 3/16th or so reveal around door.
• Do windscreen transition and layups
• Sand, fill, sand, fill, sand.... the area's around the transparencies and any areas I want to look better
• Finish and paint inside of door.

Hey only 5 things but like I said in the beginning certain tasks such as the sand, fill repetitive process will take weeks if not months!

Empennage Revisit

About a year ago I called my Empennage finished.  I mentioned that it's more of a 'done for now' type thing than being finished.  I decided to wait to do this aft piece to make it easier to mess within the tailcone while I tried to figure out what all happens back there. There were several things I wanted to work through at a later day before I went ahead and riveted on the aft tailcone skin.  Could of done this a year ago but really didn't know, wanted to limit my time climbing into the tailcone.

I'm actively working through the doors which involve some fiberglass work leaving gaps of time to work on other things.  One of these things was to finish up the riveting of the aft top tailcone skin.  Since I have a good idea of what's going to go back there I decided to at least get cable tie bases secured. I also used some caterpillar edging around the lightening holes where I will end up with cabling pushed through. Below is a picture showing the cable tie bases secured to the side.  I ended up mirroring both sides to give me options later on when running cabling.  These are just 3/4" bases where I used acetone to remove the factory adhesive and I used some super strong 3M 2 part epoxy type stuff to glue it to the sides.  Surface prep is always important so when you figure out where you want to put these you can just sand a bit off.  To test I pulled on these fairly hard to a point that if I kept pulling would end up just puckering the skin.

Secured cable tie bases 

With that out of the way I riveted up the aft skin.  A majority of it I did solo but found it much easier and had better results with a second set of hands.  My neighbor came down and helped buck these rivets (He ended up having to crawl into the tailcone).  This was one of the few times that I've riveted with two people and to be honest you get a much more consistent result when you can focus on holding the rivet gun in place.  Looking back it would of been nice to do the entire plane with two people. After that we cleaned it up a bit and cleco'd back on the center section.  I will wait till much later to rivet this piece on.  Probably during final assembly.

Aft skin riveted in place.

Finishing Kit Delivery

It took about two and a half months but this morning my finishing kit was finally delivered.  To be fair the original date was early January but I traveled for work two last month for extended period so had them put a delay on shipping until I knew I was going to be here for a week.  Surprisingly the box was a lot smaller than I anticipated.  There was a small puncture in the box so cracked it open while the driver was still here to make sure nothing was damaged.  All is good.

Finishing Kit

With my neighbors assistance we were able to inventory the kits fairly expeditiously. After a few hours everything was accounted for and in place for future attachment to the plane.  The pictures are a bit misleading as everything still takes up quite a bit of space, but there are a lot of larger pieces.

Avionics Fans

This plane will end up with a lot of equipment both on the panel and sitting behind the panel.  This leads to heat generation which isn't the best thing for electronic components.  The RV-14 kit actually has you install two fans on the glare shield and many builders of the RV-10 have taken it upon themselves to add a few fans of their own.  I decided to join in on the fun, and at the same time log a little build time.

The idea is fairly simple, mount two fans under the glare shield to push the hot air out and replace with cooler air under the foot well. An added effect to these is they will also function as defrosters on the windshield.  At first the idea of flying at any time when I have ice on my windshield seems a bit nutty but my neighbor who is a military pilot said it has more to do with condensation. As a result some people have wired these fans to a switch labeled 'defrost' and manually turn it on and off.  I'm not going to do that but rather have them wired in a way that they remain on anytime I have the master on.  The added benefit is when you shut down the plane you'll know your master is left on if you hear the fans.

In regards to fan selection most any computer style cooling fan will probably work.  The common size seems to be 80mm or around 3" fans although I've seen larger ones and smaller ones used by builders.  I went with 80mm and probably spent way too much time selecting the ones I wanted.  In my typical overthinking method I wanted ones that were relatively thin as to not impose onto the forth coming avionics install, while still moving a lot of air and keeping someone quite (Which is silly given the engine is 2 feet away). I selected the OD8025-12HB from Digi-Key with an associated cover (10020-1-5170). These fans seemed to offer a good balance of air throughput and sound.

Something to note on the installation is there is very very little margin of error in lining up the fan hole with the guard attachment holes. On some of the side about a 1/16 of an inch hang out under the grill screen.  I'm not particularly concerned with that because I will be covering the glareshield with some type of material which will require me to work it around the holes so it will end up getting recovered.  However if you don't plan on doing something like that and that detail will bug you then maybe do the hole a bit smaller than the fan size.

Holes Drilled

Installed Top

Installed Bottom

New Year, N Number and Panel/Electrical Designs

N Number

Last year I reserved N405JW but I wasn't really sold on it.  Over the last year I've been waiting for something that I liked better.  A fantastic resource to use is an aggregation site at http://www.tailnum.com/. This makes the registry searchable as well allows you to see newly released numbers available.  Hey and it also happens to be maintained by a fellow RV builder. While it's very possible I might change it again, at this point I registered an am going with N910W. Easy to remember and fairly self explanatory being a combination of the build and my last name.

Panel Design

Haven't made a lot of physical progress in the build over the last month.  I'm awaiting the finishing kit and decided to use the time to jump into finishing up a few planning items. Not only did this require putting some things down on paper but an extensive amount of reading! In the end I think I ending up reading 5 books and countless posts, logs and other bits of information. The last book I read on the subject really should of been my first book and is Marc Ausman's Aircraft Wiring Guide.  Marc was the original designer of the Vertical Power system that I'll be using.  The book is short (80 pages), concise and is a great intro into the subject.  It has a bit of marketing material on the VPX but since I'm already sold on it I wasn't bothered.

Digging into panel design is so far my favorite part of the build.  I actually started looking into this before I even ordered the first kit.  The ability to customize essentially everything that goes into it is a huge draw and really shifted me from the certified market over to the experimental.  The path of progression started by looking at other panels, learning about the various components and trying to determine a starting point of what fits your flying mission.

I started drawing out designs on a piece of paper and soon moved to using MS Paint in sort of a Frankenstein panel creation method.  This got me through a good 10 or so revisions.  Recently I transferred that over to a Visio drawing which is a lot easier to modify and maintain.  Pending any major changes in product lines this is very close to what I will go with.

Panel Design

The quick rundown is I wanted a solid single pilot IFR capable platform.  I want to have full access to everything with a good bit of visibility for night flights where I don't have to wear a headlamp or install a ton of lights.  I'm obviously a Garmin fan because essentially the entire panel is made up of their product line.  What you can't see on the panel are the remote comm #2, transponder and ADSB stuff which will be remotely controlled through the other devices.

Each rocker switch will be customized illuminated switches and everything flows in a particular phase of flight process.  Ie Left side are the starting functions, first set of buttons are the most used ones, the lights are together and the A/C Climate stuff is together.  I may move the ELT things (Top left) around but not sure.

I'm putting a lot of functionality on the control sticks themselves. I will essentially be able to fly 'hands on' during the critical phases of flight (Take off & Landing).  Not shown is the throttle, props and mixture which will be on the center console.

Electrical System

Think about building a car, then think about trying to figure out how all the wiring is connected between everything and you'll have a good idea of what goes into building a plane. You can buy a harness and use some plans from Vans but you'll end up with a very plane Jane set up.

Not interested in that approach I've spent the last few months off and on either reading about electrical systems or working on a set of drawings to the design.  I'm off the hook on somethings like the interconnecting harnesses between the avionics.  I'm going to get those through Stein Air on a majority of the devices which saves time, but really saves headache and heartache of trying to complete that on my first project.

What I first focused on was the component layout of the plane to determine where physically everything will be located.  This also forces you to think about everything and even in this basic exercise I added and removed things multiple times.  The endish result looks like this-

Component Overview

Once you have a panel design figured out and where you want to put the components you start to dig into how power is going to be distributed.  This has quite a steep learning curve as it requires you to read about the requirements of your planned components, look at other peoples designs and make some decisions.  

What a mess right?  I promise it makes sense... or at least I hope it does.  It really gives you a great idea of the various wires and connections you'll need to make to get power throughout the plane. It again forces you to really understand what you're putting in the plane even down to the wire size.  I probably made at least 10 major revisions on the above and as it stands now will probably be tweaked continually throughout the life of the plane.

I found out that electrical systems are HIGHLY debatable.  There's no one right way to do it and what is within the comfort level of some people is not for others.  The basis of my design is to allow several backup options if I lose ship power in IMC (Clouds).  If I can see out the plane window I'm less concerned about being able to fly and land safely but in the clouds losing something like attitude indication can be a real problem.

What I'm going with is a single main battery with dual alternators. I'll also utilize a smaller backup battery for the main EFIS, GPS and a few other items.  The last resort is the Garmin G5 which also has it's own backup battery.  Again my goal if I have a problem isn't to continue the flight through IMC until I run out of gas, it's to get out of the clouds and land.  If your mission is otherwise then you can really build it as redundant as you want.

These are just a few of the drawings I wanted to share.  I would suggest in building your project you put together a 'book' of drawings in whatever format you want.  So far I have a total of 7 separate drawings that cover in details some of the specific items in the plane.  Will be invaluable in future troubleshooting or modification en-devours.