Matt's RV-8 Project



Matt Dralle's RV-8 Project
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Date:  4-5-2015
Number of Hours:  1.00
Manual Reference:  
Brief Description:  All New Metal Windshield Bezel Yet Again - Part 01

Well, last weekend I thought I was done with the RV-8 rebuild windshield. I happily removed all of the layers and layers of tape protecting the Plexiglass this time around and stood back and admired the latest iteration of windshield on this never-ending project. Much to my dismay, though, something wasn't quite right... Yeah, my thought's exactly. It seems that somehow during the fitting and drilling of the metal bezel, I had gotten the right side aft of the left side by about 1/4" of an inch! I even remember at one point noticing that, but then being so engrossed in other alignment issues surrounding the new spacers that I never gave it another thought. With all of the tape mostly obscuring the view it was really hard to even notice. The biggest mistake I'd made was aligning the bezel to the sliding part of the canopy instead of the roll bar, since as it turned out, the canopy doesn't exactly close uniformly left to right.

So, the reality was that probably nobody in the world would ever notice this misalignment, and everything else about the new windshield install looked pretty A+. So, that Sunday I decided to just sit on it a while and think about the situation. Maybe it was fine and I was just being too obsessive compulsive about it - like everything else on this rebuild. Or maybe it would bug me for ever and make me grow to fall out of love with 'ol Ruby Vixen II. So I stewed on it for a few days. Wednesday night, I came home from work and had decided to redo the bezel. But after I got out to the shop and had another look, I was less convinced that it was worth the effort. "What if I cracked or scratched the Plexiglass removing the old bezel?", I thought. "What if, I cracked or delaminated the fiberglass bezel I'd just spent 2 weeks and a lot of pain finishing?", I pondered. Wednesday night all of that just seemed like too many risks just to get that metal bezel perfect. So, I went to bed convinced that I was just going to live with it.

Cont. Next Log...
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All New Metal Windshield Bezel Yet Again

All New Metal Windshield Bezel Yet Again

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All New Metal Windshield Bezel Yet Again

All New Metal Windshield Bezel Yet Again

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All New Metal Windshield Bezel Yet Again

All New Metal Windshield Bezel Yet Again

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