Matt's RV-8 Project



Matt Dralle's RV-8 Project
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Date:  6-6-2013
Number of Hours:  1.00
Manual Reference:  
Brief Description:  Canopy Side Skirt Initial Fitting - Part 02

After a lot of various option trying, I opted for what I thought was probably about the right place and drilled the hole. You can't actually fit the skirt down onto the canopy until you drill the hole, but you can't really know were to drill the hole until you fit the skirt. Catch 22, for sure. Anyway, I first thought that I had mis-drilled the hole (!) but then in looking more closely, I think I got it perfectly aligned! Whew. The right side initial fitting went on a lot easier. It just fits better and there is also no handle hole to negotiate either.

So, initial fitting is complete and I'm pretty happy with the results so far. Next, I'm going to untape just the top edge and use a hole-duplicator tool to mark the hole locations for the existing screws in the canopy/frame. I will then drill these, countersink them, and then put the skirts back on along the top edge. From there, the canopy frame cross members and lower support arm will get pre-drilled, and then the hole location transfer process similar to the upper holes. One thing I didn't do on the canopy on Ruby 1.0 was build up some fiberglass bridges under those cross members. This resulted in the slight deforming of the skirts inward where the screws were. This really zapped the smooth, cool looking appearance of the skirts. This time, despite the fact that its going to take a heck of a lot more time, I'm planning on building custom fiberglass bridges for each of the 6 cross members. That's going to be a lot of work and I'm not exactly sure how its going to look on the inside. The outside will definitely look a lot better, but the jury is out on the pleasing appearance of the inside. Such is the experience with most things on this project... ;-/
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Canopy Side Skirt Initial Fitting

Canopy Side Skirt Initial Fitting

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Canopy Side Skirt Initial Fitting

Canopy Side Skirt Initial Fitting

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Canopy Side Skirt Initial Fitting

Canopy Side Skirt Initial Fitting

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