Brake Lines

The Adele Clamps arrived today for the brake lines on the gear legs. I put them on one side to see how they looked. After I put them on, I wasn't really happy with the way they looked or they way they exposed the lines to the air stream. They also have the potential for snagging anything sticking up when landing off airport. This is the accepted way of doing it but I'm not loving it.

So, I came up with an alternative way to do this. Using some discarded rubber fuel tubing, I cut some small pieces and slit them lengthwise so I could slip them over the brake line. Then I used some Grip Lock Ties to secure them to the legs.

Then in an effort to make them less noticeable and smaller I cut the tubing pieces in half and reinstalled them on the legs. I ended up with enough to do the entire leg.

I think this looks a lot better and will be even better when I get the correct size tubing to match the OD of the brake line. The lines are tucked in behind the gear leg much tighter and the Grip Lock Ties are less obtrusive. I'll make a final decision tomorrow after I get the smaller tubing and install it.

Wiring Progress, Speakers, Prop Hub

I installed the black plug on the voltage regulator that Chris had previously wired. Since neither the voltage regulator or the plug were marked, after some online searching, I figured out which side of the plug was the power and which was the ground. Chris then wired up the ground to the engine side tree.

Chris continued working on the ground tree today. He was able to eliminate a few grounds from the remaining group and completed two rows of grounds. Only a 100 or so to go

While at it, he wired up the speakers with a couple of waterproof plugs. I'm thinking about how to restrain the wires and plugs.

There is a plate that is riveted to the top of the speaker bracket. Both the windshield and the skylight screw into this plate. The speaker bezels are a tad too big and stick up where the top plate goes. So, I'll have to cut/sand off this bit to fit flush with the plate when installed.

The prop bolts came in today. Unfortunately the spacer to engine flange bolts were not threaded all the way and won't work. The good news, the spacer to prop hub bolts fit perfect.

Speakers in the Windishield Bracket

I stole this idea (the speakers) from Paul, he mentioned that he was doing this as a convenience. I thought about it and decided it would be a nice addition. Parked on the ramp or camping, to be able to listen to music or the tower without using the headsets. Nice. Paul found these speakers on Amazon, they were small and looked to be perfect for the task. I followed suit, now where to mount them?

I decided to put them in the windshield head rack bracket which was already built. I tried to drill 2" holes in the bracket. It didn't go well and I messed it up. The right hole in the pic ended up too big. I used the messed up bracket to determine exactly where the speaker needed to be mounted for the next bracket.

There are a couple of issues with this install, the large tube at the top of the head rack pushes the speaker up to the top of the bracket which is bent limiting where it can be mounted. This requires very precise hole placement which I did not get right on the first go around.

So, off to the metal depot to retrieve another piece of 6061-T6 aluminum and another try. I was able to duplicate the basic outline of the original piece and before bending it, I set up the drill press and got the holes drilled correctly. After drilling the holes I mounted the speakers in the flat sheet and then proceeded to bend the piece to final shape. One last task was to trim the excess and file/sand to finished shape.

Of course, nothing goes easily. My Harbor Freight brake decided to act up and not bend the bracket. I had to spend some quality time re adjusting it to work correctly. I finally got the bracket bent correctly. They're ready to be wired.

I received the black plug for the Yamaha voltage regulator today from Ian Bang. Chris wired it up with 10 gauge wire. I need to remove the coolant tank to install it.

Wiring Progress

Chris began terminating the grounds for the system today. Spent the majority of the time sorting and tracing them to label them. Once they were all labeled, he got five of them terminated. Only about a 100 or so to go...

I received my small plastic overflow tank from Cathy Henry. One more piece of the engine puzzle.

Brakes, Firewall, Turbo

I finished up the brake lines today. Next step is to fill the reservoir, bleed the system and check for leaks. Once the system checks out, I'll finalize mounting the brackets, and standoffs on the gear legs.

I also temporarily installed the coolant tank on the firewall, cut the hose to connect it to thermostat housing, extended the hose on the thermostat housing to push the housing closer to the firewall without touching the voltage regulator. This was to verify everything was fitting without problems.

I temporarily mounted the waste gate servo in the bracket I made to verify fit.

 

I had to clock the turbo to fit the plumbing for the intercooler. The pic of the engine on the hoist shows how it was before I changed it.

Before

After

Wiring Continued

Worked on the wiring today. Chris and I sorted out the ground wires and rerouted them to the pilot's side of the plane since I mounted the ground tree on that side. This required quite bit sorting the wires to find the optimal routes. Chris wired up the solenoids, battery, the master switch and VPX. Everyday a little closer to finishing up.

 

We separated out the black wire grounds from the white wire grounds and will begin terminating the white wires on the far side of the ground plane working across to the near side with the black wires. Once all the grounds have been terminated we'll fire up the panel and smoke check it. If there are no problems, we'll start tidying everything up.

Firewall Continued

Back to work on the firewall. My shipment of hardware arrived and I was able to get the proper sized bolts for the solenoids and coolant tank bracket and mounted them. I also picked up my bracket that I made for the waste gate servo that I had polished. I drilled out the rivet holes, cleaned everything up and riveted it to the firewall. Lastly, I drilled out a 2.25" hole for the ECU cabling. I had to go that big in order to get the terminated end fitting through the hole. There were several other plugs and relays attached that needed to pass through as well. I've deburred the hole and have some gorilla tape on it temporarily to protect the cable. I will fabricate a cover for this hole that will neck down to the cable size you see in the pic. I have at least two holes left to drill, for both fuel supply and return lines with perhaps one small hole for sensor cables. Not sure about that yet. I'll probably mount the engine to verify all that I have done and make some decisions about the next holes.

Firewall

I've been trying to figure out the layout of all the parts that need to be mounted to the firewall. First task was to decide where to mount all the parts that need to go on the upper part of the firewall. This is because I needed to drill through the fiberglass windshield mount before riveting it to the firewall. I wanted to debur the holes and the fiberglass before riveting together. Once mapped out, I had to remove the engine to allow drilling. After the holes were drilled and deburred, I riveted the fiberglass to the firewall and then mounted the voltage regulator, the ground tree, and the coolant tank.

While I was drilling holes I figured out where the two solenoids were to be mounted and got them temporarily mounted.

I have the main engine/ECU harness and fuel delivery holes to go. I'll get those taken care of the end of next week when I return from a trip.

Waste Gate Servo Bracket

Not one to reinvent the wheel, I stole an idea from Chris Wallen. I saw a pic of a bracket he made for his installation and copied it to the best of my ability. So, here is a pic of his bracket followed by my version. I'll send this out to be polished.

Chris Wallen's bracket

Cowling

I started roughing in the cowling tonight. I began with the bottom cowl, cut the prop shaft hole and taped it in place. I then did the same to the upper cowl and laid it in place. This is just the preliminary stages. There is a whole lot of work to be done here.