Thu Mar 31 2022

Rear canopy latch rollers

The right side roller was more challenging. It's mostly because the aluminum angle at the aft end of the side rail wasn't welded on quite right, so it makes that latch sit a bit too far aft.

I decided to sand a shim down that would tip the top of the canopy latch roller aft and the bottom of the roller forward. Tod do so, I riveted a little angle to the piece I was sanding so that it didn't get sucked down into the gap between the table and the sanding disc. Note, I've prevously sanded the end of this block to the correct angle so that I end up with a tapered shim over the mounting length.

Here's the piece of (now tapered) material from which I will cut a shim. You can see that it goes from full material thickness (.040) to zero thickness over the length of the mounting surface of the roller bracket.

So, since the bracket will now be sitting at a slight angle, I made another shim to go between the roller bracket and the nut so the bolt isn't in bending when the nut is tightened.

Not perfect, but much better engagement with the latch.

However, another problem is that the slot is positioned slightly too far forward. Here, I'm extending the slot by 1/8".

All done.

Last thing for today...I sanded down and polished the welds on the sides of the brackets. I'm going to be using some delrin guides to guide the canopy when it closes, and therefore want a nice smooth surface where these guides will interface.