I came out this morning and pulled all of the spacers holding the rear window in place.  I closed the canopy to check the fit and I’m super happy with the fit.  I needed to apply sealant to both the front and back of the joint, so I climbed into the baggage area.  This was a huge pain, and I’m not looking forward to having to do this in the future for maintenance.  Since Jenn was entertained by my discomfort, she caught another picture of me.

Here’s the finished bead of Sikflex.  The rear window is officially done!

With all the adhesive work done, I can start putting some of the interior in place.  I can’t install everything since I’ll still need access to do the final assembly, but I can go ahead and install some things that won’t need to come out.  First up is the seat belts.

Next, I installed the upper side panels.  The lower panels can’t go in yet since the seat pans have to come out to attach the wings.  I also installed the pilot’s seat so that I could adjust the seat belts.

In addition to sanding the skin in front of the canopy, I sanded the edge of the canopy in preparation for fiberglassing.  Also, the front edge of the canopy was sitting a bit above the canopy frame, so I fabricated three small clips that I pop riveted to the canopy frame to hold the edge down.  I painted the back side of these black so that they won’t show through on the inside.

Here’s a closeup of one of the clips.  The outer two pop rivets are hidden inside by the canopy frame brace, but the center one will show on the inside, so I’ll have to paint it.

I mixed up some dry micro with some black pigment and filled the gap between the leading edge of the canopy and the skin.

I impregnated some 8.9oz satin weave cloth with epoxy and marked strips of widths in 1/4″ increments from 1/2″ to 2″.

Pro-Tip: I really should have added some black pigment to the epoxy used in these strips. The color is very apparent from inside the plane.

I laid the layers of glass from narrowest to widest to create a nice transition from the skin to the canopy.  This will still need a bunch of filler to make the transition have a uniform radius, but this will provide the strength for the fairing.

I estimated fitting the rear window was going to take me a few hours, but I forgot to take into account how much of a fucking perfectionist I am :-).  After spending most of two days on this, I’m very happy with how it is turning out.  Here’s the window installed for good with all the screws in place.

I adjusted all of the spacers so the window is almost perfectly in line with the canopy when it is latched.

Finally, I put the first batch of Sikaflex in place between the spacers.  I’ll put the final bit of Sikaflex on in the morning and I’ll know for sure how well it turned out.

Today is Christmas, but between our family celebration in the morning and dinner with my dad and step-mom in the evening, I managed to put in 4-5 hours working on the rear window.  I didn’t think fitting this would take so long, but there were several adjustments that had to be made.  I sanded to the line I marked yesterday and then repeated closing the canopy, marking 1/32″ back, and sanding to the line until the canopy could close fully.  I still need to open the gap further, but I could start trying the get the two surfaces to align.

Due to the geometry of the roll bar and canopy, the sides of the rear window were pushed out beyond the sides of the canopy.  The number 2 here is the number of 32nds of an inch that the window side needs to pull in (from 0.124″ to 0.061″).

Here you can easily see how bad the misalignment is with a straightedge held against the rear window.

I masked the inside surface of the rear window the first 8″ or so up the side and sanded down to the required thickness.  This surface will be glued later, so you’ll never see this or likely even notice that the window is thinner here.  I’m also not worried about any strength loss since the whole surface will be glued instead of just a couple of screws through this area.

After sanding, you can now see that the sides line up nicely.  Tomorrow will be opening up the gap and getting the rest of the surfaces as aligned as possible.

I removed all of the masking so that I could open the canopy and climb inside to finish applying the adhesive.  Jenn caught a picture of me working.

This is a lousy picture, but I applied a bead of adhesive on both the inside and outside of the canopy frame bow.

After scraping most of the excess adhesive away with an aluminum scraper I fabricated with a small radius, I removed the tape that was defining both sides of the bead.  I used my finger dipped in mineral spirits to create a nice smooth fillet.  It’s not perfect, but I’m happy with it.

I still need to do a final trim of the front edge of the rear window, so I put some masking tape on the roll bar and marked the aft edge of the canopy.

After installing the rear window, I transferred this line to the rear window.  I’ll sand close to this line and then start the final fitting.  Van’s specifies a 1/32″ gap between the canopy and rear window.

I fabricated some spacers to hold the canopy frame bow in the correct position relative to the roll bar and then clamped the two together.  I also created some spacers out of some scrap baffle seal material to space the canopy the correct distance from the canopy frame bow.  I then removed the electrical tape that was along the top of the canopy frame bow and primed it with the Sika 209 primer.

I also masked and applied a couple of coats of the Sika 209 primer to the aft edge of the canopy.

I reinstalled the canopy and installed all of the screws along the sides.

I climbed inside through the open back window and applied a preliminary bead of Sikaflex 295 UV adhesive between the spacers.  Once the adhesive sets up, I’ll remove the spacers and apply a single bead across the whole box.  Getting inside this way was tough.  I’m 6’4″, so it was quite the contortion act.  I ended up laying down in the baggage area and slithering under the crossbar.

I added a little bit of weight across the center to hold the canopy down against the spacers.

In preparation for fiberglassing the front edge of the canopy, I sanded the skin with some 80 grit sandpaper.

I then laid up some electrical tape to define the upper edge of the fiberglass fairing.

I laid up two layers of black electrical tape 1″ up from the bottom edge of the plexiglass and then laid up 1 layer of yellow electrical tape slightly back from the edge of the black electrical tape.  This will be more visible through the filler and help me sand uniformly.  I’ll sand the plexiglass below the line and lay up the fiberglass tomorrow.

After a quick trip to Disneyland with the family, I resumed work installing the canopy components for the last time. Here are the guide blocks installed.

I also installed the canopy lift strut mounts.

I installed some UHMW tape on the canopy latch mounting brackets and then trimmed them flush with the edges.  Punching the bolt holes was a pain, but I got it done.

I got the canopy latch back from the anodizing shop and installed it as well.

Finally, I installed the canopy frame and the lift struts.  I got the bolts in, but am not going to torque them down unless I’m sure the canopy frame will not need to come off again.

I installed the roll bar for good tonight.

Remember to install the AN509-10R10 screws that are hidden behind this skin before installing the roll bar.  I only installed the lower AN509-8R8 screw completely since I need to be able to flex this skin back to install the rear window.

There are a bunch of fasteners to install inside the roll bar.  It’s a pain to reach in here, but I managed to get everything in place without too much trouble.

I also shot and bucked the rivets that attach the roll bar support channel to the aft fuselage.  There are 8 AN426AD4-7 rivets tying the top skin, baggage aft wall bulkhead and roll bar support channel together as well as a few more AN470AD4-4 rivets tying the channel to the bulkhead.

Finally, I installed the canopy support channel cover for good.  I need to paint a few of these AN509-8R8 (or shorter) screws and replace these at some point, but that can wait for now.

I painted a bunch of screws although I later realized there are still a few more I need to paint.

I also repainted the upper canopy latch.

Here’s the roll bar.

And here’s the cover for the roll bar support.  I painted it vertically this time to keep the dust off and it turned out much better.

Finally, here’s the canopy frame.

I received the correct paint color from Stewart Systems (I hope), so I sanded down all of the components I previously painted.  Some of the components had some dust or overspray on them anyway since I sprayed them flat, so I’m glad I’m repainting them anyway.

The canopy frame was the worst to sand because there are so many nooks and crannies.  I still need to wipe everything down with solvent before spraying, and I’m sure I’ll need to put on at least a couple of coats, so painting is going to have to wait until tomorrow night.