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Build Update March 31: Firewall Forward Finishing


Over the last couple weeks I've been checking off everything left on the firewall forward installation. 



I painted the inside of the cowling with an acrylic paint to protect the fiberglass from oil and engine gunk. 


Here I used spot filler to fill all the little depressions. I used a old card to push it into the surface and then let it dry. 

Once it was dry I sanded the surface flat.


Here I glued in the eyeball vents.

Here I installed my new spark plugs and routed the cables from the ignition coils to the spark plugs. I gapped the plugs according to the aerovee manual. 


Here I installed the CHT probes and then reinstalled the intakes.

Here I finally got to glue in the blockoff I made months ago for the fuel filler neck. I gooped it up with plenty of RTV and slid it in.


After plenty of sanding and priming I finally decided it was time to stop the endless cycle of sand and prime and throw some color on. 


My paint scheme will have the cowling be mostly orange but I'm not going to add the orange until I do the vynil wrap so that I can match the colors best. 



Here is what should be the last label I put in a wire. And with that, my electrical system's ends have all been tied off.


This is the most exciting part of the whole cowling build. I finally got to put the guns on. I had made test parts to practice gluing the guns but now it was time to do it for real. Because of the shape of the cowling it was a little harder to pin them in place. I was able to to rig some stuff to hold all the guns squared and centered. In the end they ended up great. I am now, correct me if I'm wrong, the only Sonex with nose cannons.




The instrument panel is getting closer and closer to finished and a few days ago I finished my custom labels.



Now I finally got the side panels glued and test fit in. 








Here is my notebook page, this is just over the past 2 weeks and all the stuff that's been checked off is crazy. There's a bunch of other small tasks that have been wrapped up. 



Here is the southcos all nice and installed 


As I'm checking off that last details before the first engine start it was finally time to buy oil for the first start. I will be live streaming the first start Wednesday evening April 1 on YouTube. I will post on Facebook and the sonex builder forum when we go live so keep your eyes peeled. 




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