A little progress XL H-58

[Chuck in Indiana]

Whew! Spring honey doos finally (mostly)complete. Time to get back at it if I plan to fly Bullet this summer.
An old repurposed gas bottle.

I put a globe valve on the bottom to control how much sand (garnet, not sand)gets mixed with about 60 lbs. of air.
Made a high tech filter funnel to reclaim the garnet..

Proof of concept..should get the job done.

As an aside.. I'm a *much* better welder, now, after welding everything. I've seen guys build another airplane because they don't like what they did when they were learning. Beyond here lies madness.. I will finish what I couldn't get to when kneeling on the floor with the foot controller between my knees, though..
Now, I just have to wait for a day when the wind sock isn't standing out so my garnet doesn't blow away.

[Chuck in Indiana]

Well, the weather isn't cooperating.. I may have to blast stuff in the hanger.    Started on covering the tail feathers. Adhesive tape over the rivets, and two coats of poly brush on the horizontal stabs and elevators.

I haven't been totally slackin' though. Mouser's 40th (!!) birthday is the 29th, and she's out of license. I always try to at least break the surly bonds on her birthday, so did the powerplant part of the annual inspection today.

I'll do the airframe part tomorrow, then I can get back to the Legal Eagle.

[Wayne Munich]

I sure would like to see that landing gear on the eagle. Not real thrilled with eagle gear.

[Chuck in Indiana]

I sure would like to see that landing gear on the eagle. Not real thrilled with eagle gear.

Agreed, but it's too heavy for an ultralight. Of course, I'll always land as lightly as a thistle down, so it shouldn't be a problem with the LE. 

[Chuck in Indiana]

Finally had a calm afternoon, and blasted the welds with my (ahem) highly engineered rig.

I can get the tubing with emery cloth and Scotch brite. Cleaned up the mess and managed to salvage most of the garnet. (cheap legal eagle builder content)
If I were 20 years younger, I'd have gone ahead and painted it.. but I'm tired and it is beer o'clock.

[Chuck in Indiana]

Went ahead and bead blasted the rest of the parts that I could get in the cabinet. Decided if I couldn't paint that stuff, I may as well start covering. 

Tools of the trade:
Paint brushes
Scissors
Single edge razor blade
Small and large iron for shrinking fabric
Teeth to chew the glue off of fingers. 
First horizontal stab covered.

Now, an iron at 250F ran over everything a few times will pull out the wrinkles, and 350F will bring it to final taughtness.There will be more, but that comes later.

[CHARLES DEBOER]

Be careful shrinking the fabric on vertical stab.  Some people have bowed the bottom rib while using 350 deg. heat.

[Kamcoman77]

Here is what mine looked like at 300°

[Chuck in Indiana]

Be careful shrinking the fabric on vertical stab.  Some people have bowed the bottom rib while using 350 deg. heat.

Thanks for that. I made the bottom rib out of 4130.
Oh, forgot. This is the old Stits HS90X lightweight fabric that is NLA.

[Chuck in Indiana]

Here is what mine looked like at 300°

Neatly done (of course) Keith.  I just did the stab at three fiddy without issue.

[Chuck in Indiana]

Not much warp on the 4130 bottom rib of the vertical stab..

However, after reading of it being a good idea to make the leading edge out of 4130 also, I did that.
Probably not a good idea.
Apparently, the leading edge said, "I ain't moving.." and the spar said "I give!"

Hopefully, it will still all go together at final assembly.

[Chuck in Indiana]

Finally got a calm (!) day, and painted the fuselage, landing gear, engine mount, etc. with Poly Fiber epoxy primer. I know.. it's only epoxy but wore a paint suit anyway. Whew! I was soaked with sweat, and when I pulled off my rubber gloves, water literally poured out of them.  I'm getting too old for this stuff. 

Hung stuff to cure, carefully detailed the paint gun, and called it a good day.

Not stripping and cleaning each part of the paint gun will make a fine anchor for a very small boat when shooting epoxy. 

[Dan_]

Yer not too old... Yer just the right age to enjoy what you do. 

It shows..!

[Chuck in Indiana]

Well, live and learn as they say..

I'll make a rib to beef up the vertical stab.It looks like it wouldn't hurt to put another rib in the rudder, too.
I really don't like not bringing the fabric up to 350. I've seen loose fabric in Indiana Winters..
Oh well. I'll cover the fuselage while thinking about it.

[Chuck in Indiana]

Let's cover the fuselage.

Ya know, I just *knew* that this was the old light weight Stits HS90X. Never even looked at the stamp.  It's regular fabric. I have it, though, and I'm going to use it. (shrug)

First coat of Poly Brush and a pretty good buzz.  Time to leave the shop for a while.