Anyway, the first thing we did was match-drill the aluminum strip set aside from back in section 10 (tailcone). I had to think for a second where I put the darn thing, and eventually found it.
The aluminum strip set aside in 10-12 Step 1. I wrote "SAVE!!" on it in a number of places.
Match-drilling this, along with the two side strips was fairly straightforward, maybe just a bit boring and tedious, but we got through it pretty quickly. Next, we had to countersink all the holes in the cabin cover that we had made. I whipped up a small 0.032" spacer as recommended in the plans to hold the microstop square with the flange on the cover.
Countersinking the cabin cover, using a 0.032"spacer
I dimpled the other side of the spacer with a #30 dimple to trial-fit the countersinks
Otherwise, that's basically it! The next part of the plans basically has you final-install the cover to the fuselage. We're not quite ready for that yet, now we still have to design and fabricate an overhead console and all kinds of other stuff. Hopefully we'll get started on some of that this weekend.
In other news, we placed our order for avionics today.... OUCH. Biggest single purchase I've ever made, short of buying a house. I've been talking with Jed at Stein Air for a couple weeks now, narrowing down my options and figuring out what exactly we're going to do. Here's the short list of components we got:
- Garmin G3X Touch 10" Dual Display w/ EIS & XM
- Garmin GNS 750 Touchscreen NAV/COM navigator
- Garmin 3-axis autopilot with GSA-28 servos and GMC-307 control panel
- Garmin GTR 20 COM radio (for COM2)
- Garmin GAD 29 ARINC interface
- Garmin GAD 27 integrated controller (brand new product just announced last month)
- Garmin GMA 350c audio panel w/ Bluetooth
- Garmin GTX 23ES transponder with ADSB-out, paired with GDL39R ADSB-in
- Grand Rapids Mini-X backup EFIS system
- All the connectors, wiring, sensors, antennas, and more needed to get all this wired together
By the time I added everything up, I wanted to cry. Hopefully, I won't regret this purchase decision, or Garmin won't announce their new line of avionics in January or something that are twice as good and cost half as much. This really was the time to buy though, for a few reasons: (1) Garmin has their "stack up the savings" holiday rebate program going on right now through the 15th, that will give me $1000 back in rebates; (2) my credit card is giving me a 2% cash back deal through the holiday season, which for this kind of purchase is a good chunk of change; and (3) Stein Air gave me a heck of a package discount price... I couldn't come within $500 anywhere else.
As nervous as I am about the purchase, I'm pretty confident that this is the right system for me though, after lots of careful consideration and research. Excited to get started wiring all this stuff up! Quick plug for Stein Air, they have been awesome to work with so far and I'm very happy with the experience up to this point. With a reputation like theirs, I'm quite sure the rest of the experience will go just as well!