Nastiest part of building an aircraft

[colospace]

I'm sure RV folks would say ProSealing their tanks is the nastiest thing about building an aircraft. But for us Kitfoxers, I nominate cutting and sanding the plexiglass. I thought the bubble doors was a mess, but I just spent the afternoon cutting and sanding on the windscreen, and still not done. That fine powder gets everywhere! I need an assistant to keep a vacuum going right at the work point.

[jmodguy]

crappy cowl...

[dcsfoto]

second that

[jrevens]

crappy cowl...

I agree... this goes along with Eddie's (EFWD Build) recent posts about his cowl also. A little more quality and care in manufacturing these parts would mean a lot, IMHO.

[rosslr]

I'm with you John. I was rather surprised at the poor quality of the cowlings when they arrived - I am no expert but I think in this day and age it would be possible form the cowls to be a lot more accurate fit than they are. Why they can't be close to a perfect fit I dont get.

cheers

r

[David47]

Trimming the doors and the bucket seats has been the crappiest work for me so far. My workshop looked like I was into making cocaine with white powder everywhere....

[efwd]

I believe the FAA 51% rule has part in how finished things are. As it turned out, I found the process of doing my cowl was pretty rewarding. Scary at first but members here have aided that quite well.
Eddie

[colospace]

I agree with you Eddie on the "scary" part of doing the cowling. I really benefited from looking at Tom Waid's build photos to help conceptualize the details of how it should look in the end. (And I can deal with the fiberglass dust much better than the plexi fine grit.)

[Cherrybark]

Both jobs are down the road a bit for me. I'm trying to keep my head down and plod along without stewing about them too much. My firewall forward kit arrived a couple of weeks ago. The quality of the cowls was disappointing at first glance. All part of the shared experience.

Eddie's thread has turned into a "How To" seminar with problems coming up and being resolved a few months before I come to the task.

[jrevens]

I got off on a tangent a little, Gary, but I agree that cutting the Plexiglas can be a messy job... I got that crap in my hair, eyes, ears & every other nook & cranny in the vicinity. I think part of my problem was using the Dremel tool with the cut-off wheel. It seems as though I've had a cleaner time of it on previous acrylic cutting projects, using a larger (3 or 4") cut-off wheel chucked in a regular corded drill motor. The slower speed didn't seem to throw so much dust everywhere.