Firewall and other things

With the canopy set aside, I got started on some of the firewall items that are easier to do now before the engine mount is in place. Here you can see the black battery box (w/o battery for now), and below that, the master relay and the starter relay. Just to the right of the relay is doubler that will soon have the fuel bulkhead fitting. I want to finish the cockpit fuel lines so I can go ahead and bolt in the rudder pedals and rivet up the forward fuselage stucture (except the skin). You can also see the brake fluid reservoir (upper left) and the manifold for oil temp and pressure and fuel pressure sensors (just clecoed on for now in upper right)
I also riveted in the baggage floors and the seat floors. They are pop riveted in place since there is no access for a bucking bar.

I also fabbed up all the aileron and elevator pushrods. Here are the two large aileron pushrods and the large elevator pushrod. The large aileron pushrods go from the control column to the aileron bellcranks in the wings. There are also two much smaller pushrods that go from the bellcrank to the ailerons. Likewise, the elevator uses a smaller pushrod from the control column to a bellcrank just aft of the baggage area, then the large pushrod goes from the bellcrank to the elevator itself. In the photo above the tunnel for the smaller elevator pushrod is visible between the floor skins.

canopy progress

There was progress on the canopy before winter took hold here. I made the big cut, separating the plexiglass bubble into the fixed windscreen and the sliding part you see here. I stopped working on it in Nov, it is cooler and it's best to work on the plexiglass when it is warm. It's more pliable and less likely to crack. The next step in the spring is drilling the plexiglass to the sliding frame.