Mon Sep 21 2020

Forward fuselage and canopy structure

Doubler glued and temporarily put in place.

I cut and glued some flat sheets to replicate a rib. Mostly these will be used to set the canopy frame plywood (and the firewall) at the correct angle. There are two larger pieces of plywood here which have (more or less) perfectly parallel sides and square ends. I'm using one laying down on the table saw to hold an end plate square while gluing it to the end of the sheet standing on edge.

Trimmed the canopy jig plywood to be about 1/8" smaller than the canopy frame all around the top edge.

It's starting to become apparent that the canopy frame needs the flanges squared. This scale is resting on the firewall at the forward end, and on the canopy frame here. You can see that a skin would not lay down flat on these flanges without some major warping. I think the whole thing may need straightened as well...we'll see.