I’ve started work on the firewall penetrations. Since I’m using SDS/EFI there is a need for more wiring through the firewall than is the case for a conventional Lycoming installation. There is also a return fuel line associated with the duplex fuel system, and a fuel regulator. The location of all the parts and pass-throughs needs to be determined, so that I can drill the necessary holes. In accordance with current “best practice” for firewall insulation (in case of an engine compartment fire), I’m installing a Fiberfrax insulation layer on the engine side of the firewall. This requires a thin metal retaining layer on the front of the Fiberfrax. I bought some 0.002″ stainless steel foil for this purpose, but decided there was no way I could work with it without winding up with a crinkly mess, so I have switched to some 0.008″ Titanium.
I temporarily lifted the (Barrett) engine into position to ensure there’s plenty of room around the pass-through positions. I installed doublers for the AntiSplat air/oil separator and the A/C line pass-throughs, as well as various nutplates that are in addition to the plans.
Speaking of the engine, apart from desiccant plugs I’ve been using a home made “conditioner” to help preserve the engine until its first start. I placed about 2kg of (orange) silica gel in a sealed plastic cake container with an aquarium pump. The outlet of the aquarium pump goes through a respirator filter (to prevent any silica dust from entering the crank case), and then into the oil filler hole. A tube from the breather outlet goes into a glass bottle, and a separate tube from the bottle for return air into the plastic container. A humidity sensor in the bottle shows that the crankcase is being maintained at a humidity level of less than 10%, whereas the outside air humidity is often above 50%.
I also worked on the cowling mounts at this time. I’m going to use the Van’s hinge method for the firewall sides, and between the two cowl halves, but have decided to use Skybolts for the upper cowl firewall mount. To that end, I bought a kit of parts from Skybolt. Included in the kit are these nifty looking interlocking flanges, but when I started to work out how to lay them out, I found that I would have to adjust the spacing between skybolts in a fairly arbitrary way to have rivet holes in the flange overlaps occur in sensible places with adequate edge spacing. I really didn’t like the resulting uneven spacing, so I decided to make my own Skybolt flange mounts.
I used two sections of 0.032″ Alclad, overlapped in the middle (top). Marked out, drilled, cut, and then match drilled into place from the firewall edge with the top skin in place. I made a small overlap between the two halves, and dimpled all of the #40 holes to match the firewall. I also added a 0.02″ Alclad spacer to the assembly, same as would be used with the hinges, to allow for some filler on the cowl edge. With these cowl brackets complete, I put them aside since they can’t be riveted on until the upper front fuselage assembly is ready to rivet on. The hinges on each side, and spacers, were made in accordance with the standard plans and riveted in place. I haven’t done anything with the bottom hinges, since these are not used for the Showplanes cowl. I’ll most likely add a Skybolt or screw/nutplate on each bottom side but can’t really do that until I’ve fitted the cowl.
