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Matt Dralle's RV-8 Project
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Date: 1-23-2010
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Number of Hours: 8.00
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Manual Reference:
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Brief Description: Fiberglass Windscreen Bezel Fabrication - Part 01
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Of all the fabrication jobs on this RV-8 project, the mold-in-place fiberglass bezel around the base of the windscreen was easily the one I have dreaded the MOST. There's no part to start with or mold or anything. You just mark off the boundaries with black electrical tape, sand it down, and then start adding resin. Really. That's it. That's all you've got to work with. And to say that I hated working with fiberglass in generally would be a significant understatement. It dusty and dirty and sanding down the various layups can be time consuming, not to mention pretty abrasive on the hands from all the sand paper.
But, I couldn't put it off any longer. I'm running out of things to do on this RV-8 project and it was time to start the fiberglass bezel. Now, I might as well just come clean right from the start. The first try on this bezel didn't come out the way I wanted. As far as a fiberglass part, it looked great. The contour between the metal and the Plexi was very good. The problem was that when I was marking the lines for the black electrical tape on the Plexi, I was focusing so much on the not scratching things, that I managed to end up with a very asymmetrical line. The left side was lower than the right and the little dip in the middle was about 1.5" off center. When all was said and done, it looked great from the outside (as long as you didn't look straight at it from the spinner), but from the pilot's seat looking out, it was pretty obvious I pretty seriously F'd up the layout.
Now just imagine my state of mind about now. Here's a project that I dreaded for the entire construction process, wasn't disappointed when it came to how yucky it was, only to finish it and discover that it wasn't what I would consider "acceptable". Color me depressed. So depressed in fact, that I didn't even work on the project for about 4 days.
Cont Next Log...
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Fuselage Taped Off
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Fuselage Taped Off
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Bezel Boundries Marked
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Copyright © 2008-2024 Matt Dralle. All Rights Reserved.
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