I have reached another milestone in construction - getting the fuselage into
primer. Before priming I low baked the fuselage in our drying ovens (Industrial
fan circulated, controlled to +/- 0.5 deg C) at 43 deg C for 24 hours, to post
cure all layups and filler.
After post curing I noticed that the rear top edge of the doors had risen up to
be about 5mm proud of the fuselage. Silly me! I had forgotten to remove the gas
struts before curing. The considerable pressure that they exert when compressed
had pushed the doors away from the fuselage, and the doors had set in this
position. I have now got doors back to correct position, but this poses a much
more interesting question, what happens when the skin temperature of your Europa
reaches 40 deg C in service? Yup, your doors will move, your cowlings will
distort, etc etc.
I'm sure that this skin temperature can be reached on a very hot day, even with
everything painted white.
I can't wait to attend the first fly in at Arizona and join the other molten
blobs of plastic on the tarmac that used to be Europas!! Don't consider painting
the top of your fuselage any other colour than white!
Allan J Hall (#177)
|