Jur's RV7 Aircraft Factory
2917 hours and counting
Some decisions in life are bare of any obvious logic

Cindy was so kind to prime the little spacers so that I could spend my time today in prosealing the naca vents to the fuselage.

The advantage of having some rivets is that you can use the cleco's to clamp the naca against the skin so there's no need for extra clamps.

Wing tank construction is so long ago that I completly forgot what a mess this proseal makes.

As I had some time left, I also rivetted the small nutplates that came in from aircraft spruce Europe on the fuel pump support brackets.

Some hours later went back and rivetted the vents using the aluminum spacers.

Outside view.

Some more work done on the fuel pump. I drilled the holes for the doghouse cover. See the nutplate templates on the images below.

Then dimpled, deburred and installed the nutplates for the doghouse.

I finished fabricating the other side outer fuel line and finally got my delivery from aircraft spruce that contains my AN union fittings. So decided to make the final flares on the inner tube line and join both together.
I started panicking a bit as I didn't find a way to get the flaring tool to fit on the already installed inner fuel line until I realised that you can actually still take off the F-782-L and R cover support ribs. They are attached with jus AN515-8R8 screws in nutplates and come off easily. It's been ages since I installed these and completly forgot about that.
Screwed them off and now you can easily turn the fuel line.
Make sure all your bushings are on and all the nuts and sleeves are on in the right order before you make the flare.

Also, don't do what I did in this picture below. You can see that I took out the snap bushing out of the F-783-L center cover support rib and I had a horrible time trying to get it back in with the fuel line already running through. Once the flare is on, you can't remove the line anymore so it has to go in while the fuel line is already going through. In some way these basterds don't want to go in when the thight fit line is alreayd in there. I ended up tring several things such as pinpoints pushing the tabs in, heating, nothing worked. Finally I gently cut bit of the plastic lip at an angle and finally got it through with quite a bit of force applied. Do yourself a favour, keep the bushing in.

I took this shot when it was back in. It still sits thight and won't come loose but it costed me 3 hours of my life.

Here's the pilot side join. Nice fit.

And a shot showing the whole pilot side line.

Then did the same with the passenger side.

Another nice and thight fit here.

As I had some time left, I wanted to start putting the air vent line back in and realised I still had to install the nutplates on the forward fuselage gussets.

The #19 hole was already there so I just had to use the nutplate jig to drill two #40 holes and countersink them from the bottom.

Pulled out the pneumatic squeezer and set the rivets. Here's a bottom view of the nutplate and a nice view on the upper left engine mount.

Overall view so far

And another one with the fuel air vent lines in place.

Today, worked on the installation of the NACA vents. These are two plastic airscoops which are placed on the fuselage side skin. Outside air gets routed with flexible hose to the vent knobs in the cockpit panel.

I have recently been flying with Michael in Wollong in very hot temperatures and now I understand why these things are an absolute must under the canopy if you don't wan't to end up as a cooked egg.

I decided to make som aluminum plated to support the rivets out of 0.032" alu scrap.

Al rounded and cut.

Then positioned the scoops on the fuselage and clamped them in place. I will use both proseal and rivets so 8 rivets, 4 top, 4 bottom should be sufficient.
In the picture below, I finished drilling the holes through the fuselage side skin.

Outside view. You want the plastic sides to align with the outside shape.

Same procedure for the right side?

Next I had to use paint stripper to remove the paint from the cabin. The proseal will be better in direct contact with scuffed bare aluminum.

Now here is where it all went south for me on the fuel line installation. The part you see in the image below is the line that takes the fuel from the gascolator, brings it in through the grommet in the side skin and makes a double bent to reach the AN815 joint in the outerbay behind the fuel cover panels.
This looks easy but it's a horrible piece to make.

The image below illustrates the frustration of making the outer bend and the amount of scrap I generated trying to do so.

The two inital bends start fine but getting the angled outside bend just in the right spot is a nightmare. Making the I had to gently tweak things a bit by hand to get it finally right.

In the image below, you see the completed part from the inside.

And here is the outside view. Most builders have a nice crisp bend here on the outside towards the gascolator in port but with my bender, I just couldn't get it close enough in the bender to make a shorter bent and at the same time not scar the tubing. So I ended up with a gentle outside curve. As my friend Gordon said: "the fuel won't notice it's taking an extra turn".

Overall I'm reasonably happy with the result but it could have been better with more prior experience.