Firewall Forward

 

5 Jan 2008 My order from ACS finally came in with a whole bunch of smaller clamps so I spent some time installing those and tightening up the whole lot of 'em. For the most part, except for brake lines and prop/spinner. The FWF is ready! Whooo Hooooo!
31 Dec 2007 I'm still waiting on some smaller adel clamps from ACS, then I'm about done here as I'm finally getting to the end for the firewall forward install.
29 Dec 2007 On the 26th, Joe did make it by and did a good inspection on the engine. There were some areas where I needed to remediate some potential chaffing issues and give the spark plug leads a little more slack. So after a day messing with adel clamps, I pretty much have that nailed. The down side is that I'm now waiting on ACS for some smaller adel clamps. Joe also wanted me to seperate the egt/cht leads from teh spark plug leads as the braded egt/cht wires could eventually wear on the plug wires. One of the other things I got done was bending the brake lines. I'm waiting on an order of 12" flex lines from Pegasus Racing as I'm not going to do the loop in the tube around the axe; too many stories of lines eventually cracking.
  And finally, I did receive the right line for the fuel pump overflow so I got the fitted.
21 Dec 2007 I've been making some slow progress in finishing off the engine. Joe Pearson, Tech Councilor, is due over on the 26th to take a look; everything should go well. I'm also going to plan on first flight from Arlington instead of Auburn.  The local area is just so much better for a first flight so I arranged some temp hangar space up at AWO for several months. An order came in from ACS so I got the sniffle valve line in. I still need to do the line for the fuel pump overflow. The two eyelets just to the outside of the sniffle line are for securing the hinge pins for the lower cowl attach hinges.
  I suppose I could have just left the fiberglass natural and saved a little weight. But it does look nice. Today I just did some clean-up items like tension the alternator belt, and make sure everything was OK behind the inlet duct. I need to cut and attach the alt. air push-pull cable but that's about it for that. I need to finish up the fuel pump overflow line, put some sort of heat treatment on the throttle cable, install and cotter pin that assembly, run the heat ducting, and tighten up a bunch of adel clamps, then the engine should be about done.  I am saving the prop for last since it's going to take up some room.
15 Dec 2007 I'm trying to get a lot of the small stuff wrapped up forward of the firewall and one of those things was figuring out how to secure the Hall effect sensor. I found an adel clamp that was just the right size, then cut a delrin plug for the center. Next, drill four holes for safety wire and secure the delrin plug to the sensor. I hope the stainless wire doesn't affect the sensor. Otherwise, it seems to be very secure.
  Another one of those small jobs was safety wiring the lower baffles together. The right side was easy, but the inboard left side was kind of a pain.

Also received another order of bits and parts from Spruce, just in time for my next order. Seems like I'm back into the weekly orders now that I'm getting close.

I went back out a little later and finished up a couple things like adding about 8 more adel clamps and wiring up the hall effect to the 4.8v regulated power supply from EIS. In the course of trying to pull some of the unused wires from the EIS d-sub, using an extraction tool, the darn tool snapped, which sent the remaining tool right into my left thumb knuckle, resulting a a really deep (well at least as far as the bone would let it go) u-shaped puncture wound and resulted in a couple choice words and some decent blood flow on this. Sorry, no pics. In the 13 years of building airplanes, this one produced the most mess, but picking the soldering iron up by the tip was by-far the most painful.
  Here's a little issue I found. Just when I thought that I had a pretty decent install for the fuel sensor, I was looking at this and thought, well, that engine shakes a bit and at the location where it penetrates the baffle, it's rotational, or up and down. This isn't good. Darn! Back to the design studio.
  Here's the view from above. I have some room to play with but I need to figure this out.
12 Dec 2007 Starting off the night, I had to disassemble the exhaust hangers to bead the ends. I don't want these getting loose so off they came. Four are pictured, but I did do all six.
  This is pretty much the current status. I'm waiting on an order from AS$S for some bolts, adel clamps and other stuff, then I need to finish routing the cables/ wires. I'm not sure I have the spark plug leads in the right location so I need to work through that a bit. I've also started to tie the wore bundle with lacing cord.
  After installing almost 40 adel clamps around the engine, I'm getting pretty good. The trick is to use a couple hemostats to close the clamps, slide the bolt in, add washer and nut the release the hemostats. Seems to work fairly well and is quicker than the safety wire trick, but a lot less expensive than buying a set of adel calmp pliers.
  I mounted the oil cooler again, after swapping out the old AL. AN fittings for the proper steel fittings. Whoo-hooo, almost done with the FWF parts.
10 Dec 2007 OK, fairly cruddy picture, but I managed to slather on some high-temp sealant on the oil filter recess panel, as well as adjusting the prop governor control arm, installing the cable bearing, and securing all that. Still following the center -> outward method in securing everything.
9 Dec 2007 It's really hard to see, but just below the oil filter mount, is the AN fitting for the oil supply line. It must have taken 30 minutes to figure out how to torque this thing down, but I did get it done. I'm starting to work from the back-center, toward the outside and torque/ secure everything still loose.
27 Nov 2007 Unless you know what you're looking at, all these pictures are starting to look alike. I did receive my order of hoses so I had to fit these. So far everything appears to fit as planned. Here, you're looking at the new oil cooler return line, which has 2 90-degree angles, clocked to 25-degrees. I'll replace the blue aluminum AN fittings on the cooler with steel fittings since the supply/ return lines are stainless. Note that there's more room since the return line isn't nearly as long.
  This is the view from the bottom looking at the supply line. Per other builders, the straight fittings wouldn't work with the prop governor, so you need a line with the 45 on the end. With that, it fits.

Also on the agenda was the wiring of the fuel pressure sensor, which takes 12 v, not 4.8, oil temp, and the tach sensor. The EGT/CHT probes are all wired as is the oil pressure and fuel flow sensor. The only sensor left to wire is the hall effect ammeter so I fired up the EIS and it appears all the sensors are displaying what they should! Next on the agenda is the engine to firewall ground, and the alternator wiring, after which, the FWF wiring is about complete.
24 Nov 2007 I'm slowly making progress on the engine wiring but it seems to be moving along. Here's some of the routing for the right side EGT/CHT/ plug leads, as well as a good view of the the fuel flow sensor. Since I hadn't worked wiring in a while, I had to pick up where I left off with all the EIS leads.  Then there's the deciphering of all the EIS sensor wiring instructions. Some need the 4.8v excitation, like the fuel pressure, but the oil pressure doesn't need it.
  And this is the rat's nest. I'm trying to make some sense of all this and it's getting there. You can see the multi-color bundle along the top of the engine mount; this seemed to be a good place to run wiring to the left side of the engine. I'm also getting pretty good at fitting adel clamps!
17 Nov 2007 It was a long day in the shop and I think I got some stuff done. I started with some fiberglassing of the top cowl inboard inlet ducts and closing up a big hole I cut in the inlet air duct for clearance of the alternator. Then I started working a bunch of random tasks on the engine. Picture at left shows the oil return line. It's way too close to the breather line and mag wires, so I think I'm going to have this re-fab'd wtih 90-degree fittings. That ought to shorten this run a bit.
  I think everyone deals with this problem; the throttle cable is too close to the exhaust. After some tweaking, and what seemed like a couple hours, I did manage to get about 1/4" clearance, then I'll add the fire sleeve.
  This is getting to look like a serious bird's nest and it's going to take a little effort to keep this straight. The mag harnesses were installed and I wanted to work out some routing for those. I'm also working some routing for some of the other wires/ cables like the alternator and starter cables and it's a nice change from baffles.
    This is a bad photo, but it's meant to show the breather line. I did manage to get it barely above the left exhaust to it should empty on to that pipe. Everything in back of the engine, and in front of the firewall seems to be suggestions only in the manual.
16 Nov 2007 I've been dealing with the cowling, canopy and baffles lately so it's finally time to get back to the engine work. The alternate air by-pass needed to get worked so that's in progress today.
  The oil cooler is temp fitted. I've seen other's photos where they needed to cut out the flanges on the cooler to get teh hoses to fit, but in this case, I didn't need to make any adjustments. I was also afraid that the inboard aft flange would interfere with the engine mount but it looks OK. I'll need to order another oil supply line as it needs a 45-deg fitting on the end to fit around the prop governor, and I also need to have a new manifold pressure line (way too long), fuel supply (also too long), and the fuel sensor to spider lines made up.
  And finally, I'm temp fitting a bunch of the sensors to start figuring out where wiring is going to go. Hopefully, that doesn't take too long. The GRT manual said to place the EGT sensors 2-8 inches from the ports, and looking at the tubes, 3" is about the only place where they are going to work.
29 Jul 2007 I've been messing around with the cowl so not too much progress on the engine. I didn't much like the mongo-sized prop control oil supply line so Sue at AeroSport swapped out a hard line for me. Very cool. The downside is that this is a real pain to install and you need to pull both of the right side cylinder head oil scavenge lines.
17 Jun 2007 I thought I had this figured out. Very nice. Good location, reasonable straight run into the sensor, easy to wire. No problem.
  Bad news. Evidently I didn't put enough thought into this. Note the fuzzy plug in the background of the FloScan sensor. That's the plug for the oil fill neck. That's bad.
  So here's the solution. I just moved the sensor down the mount a bit and it works well. I need to double check on having a 45-deg fitting for the sensor outlet, but the run into the sensor is pretty straight. Good news is that Precision Airmotive is speaking at our EAA meeting in two days. Good timing!
9 Jun 2007 Now things are getting interesting. Out of the box, a lot of this stuff seems to fit decent, but the devil is in the details. Trying to get these adel clamps to go together was a lot of fun. This is the FI fuel supply line.
  Received the SD-8 stand-by alternator this week so I temp fitted that. Yup. Fits. Now remove.
  I talked to Precision Airmotive this week and they suggested placing the floscan sensor between the FI servo and the spider to dampen out the pump pulses. Sound good. I made a small mount, but I'm short a DG13 adel clamp. I also need the right fittings for the sensor and I need to have the hose re-made.
  Ouch! This just doesn't fit worth a darn. The 45-deg engine fitting for the oil cooler supply line has a big problem with the supply line and the prop govenor control cable bracket competing for the same space. Dan C's site mentions having the hose re-made with a 45-deg fitting. That might just work, as this isn't going to fit. A straight fitting here may work though.
3 Jun 2007 I can't believe it's June already. Work is a killer these days but hopefully, it's over in a week if all goes well. I was able to spend a little time in the garage monitoring e-mail and listing to a lengthy teleconference while working on the engine a bit.

Really no order here but I wanted to get some of the hoses and controls temp fitted. Here's the FI servo to spider hose, which is a little long. I need to call Precision to verify but I need to insert the Floscan fuel flow sensor in here somewhere. I'm tempted to mount it to one of the upper engine mount tubes.

  Hose and hoses. The prop control hose gets re-run after re-positioning the outlet fitting. You can see the fuel supply hose making a bend to the mechanical fuel pump and the upper hose is the servo -> spider line for the FI.
  This is fun. I swapped the arms for the FI servo as the default arm for the throttle, worked really well for the mixture. But...the arm is a little too short as the other arm was a little longer. Need to call Precision for a new arm.
  This is why I swapped arms. The starter is in the way of the previous arm so I swapped them out. This one works well for the mixture. You can also see the mixture linkage brackets. It took a while, but I finally got the linkage about right.
  And here's just hoses and control cables. The cables seemed to go in without too much of a fuss. That's a relief.
26 May 2007 I started dinkin' with the hoses today, amongst other things. I thought that the fitting for the oil pressure was going to work but looking at it, it sure looks like a very tight fit. I may just cap the fitting and stick a straight fitting in the aft opening (on this engine there are two pressure fittings; take your pick).
  Here's the governor hose. It's a little long but I really need to turn the fitting on the governor so it angles down. I'm also thinking about just running a solid tube for this instead of a hose but I need to check that out.
  I did fit the exhaust temporarily. I've heard of Van's shipping the wrong exhaust so I wanted to ensure it was the right one, which it is. It did go together without problems.
26 May 2007 So today was the day to hang the engine. I started out by heading to Auburn to go fly teh Boredom FIghter for a while. It was a pretty nice day and ended up with 1.2 hours. After which it was time to start the anual with compression check and oil draining. Luckily, the compression was all in the 70s. Not bad for a 60 year old A-65.

Got home and finished up torquing the governor head screws and running the safety wire. No problem. Make sure you do this before the engine is hung. There isn't much room back there after it's on the plane.
  Another nice thing that Aerosport does is install the oil pressure fitting with the restrictor. Van's supplies this in the f/w forward kit, but it's nice to see this already installed and at what seems to be the right angle. (Note: this really needed to be turned aft about 20 degrees; on second thought, should have caped this  and used the aft facing fitting mount).
  Mounts are ready for install. Looking at the drawings, the rubber mounts are different for top and bottom. Make sure you look close.The bottom bolts are also longer by about one bolt size so it's easy to get things mixed up.
  After about three hours, the engine is hung, and did it all by myself. A little patience and a borrowed hoist and it was a done deal. The bolts are all tightened down to the spacer, but I do need to finish torquing and install the cotter pins.
24 May 2007 Not a real great picture, but I needed to get the prop governor installed and that meant loosening the head and rotating that about 180 degrees. I didn't have to tweak the stop screws either. Very nice.I noticed on a couple web sites that guys had to use their own bolts or studs for the governor. Aerosport did come with proper studs.

 
  I unwrapped the engine and started getting it prepped for the hanging. AeroSport seemed to have done a very nice job with this.
  Dorky picture of the builder. I had to move the fuselage out of the shop because it won't fit out the door with the engine on it. So, I pushed it outside, then up the hill and around to the garage where it's going to stay until done.
  The fuselage sees daylight! It was really cool to get this moved to the garage, knowing that we're another step closer to getting this done.
18 Mar 2007 This was the part that took some time. I had to lift the fuselage up high enough to get the gear under, then jam the legs up far enough for the holes to match. You can't tap them in with a mallot so it takes a little effort. I finally got these alligned and the bolts installed! Whew....!

 
  Just when I thought I had everything together to put the wheels together, I found that we didn't have any talc around the house. Bummer. After a while Carolina had an errand to run and picked up the talc for the wheel assembly. I did this on the Boredom Fighter with the 6x600 wheels so this wasn't too bad and only took about 40 minutes to assemble both wheel assemblies. This isn't a great picture but the RV is sitting on the mains! Whooo hooo. Very Cool. I'm not sure I regret this yet or not since the fuselage is sitting very high with the tail in the air right now and I need the step stool to work in the cabin right now. Lowering the tail will help I suppose. The other thing is the front end is really getting heavy. You just don't realize how much this stuff weighs when it goes in one wire at a time.
17 Mar 2007 Had a couple things to do around the house so I didn't get too much done but did get the engine mount torqued to the firewall. I used a couple AN960 washers, opened up for an AN-6 bolt for the two lower inside mounts. The .063 width is just about right for this spacer. I haven't bent the cotterpins yet because this mount may have to come off for whatever reason, and the cotter pins are easy to reach.

I did make it out to Renton airport to see Dave Parsons. His DAR shows up this week for the big inspection. Dave really has a nice looking RV and should be a lot of fun.
  Since the mount was on it was time to start the gear assembly. At this time, I'm not sure if I'm going to leave the wheel pants fairing mount natural or have ti powder coated. Priming is not going to work just because it's in a high-wear area. As others have mentioned, there isn't squat in the Van's info on the brake assembly, so I had to dig through a couple websites to confirm my thoughts on this.
  I put the wheel on first, then marked the first hole, nut off, then drill through the axel. Put the wheel back on, tighten down the nut, mark from the opposite side, nut off, wheel off, drill all the way though, smooth hole. Done. This takes a while but seemed to be less trouble than I though going into this opperation.
16 Mar 2007 This was a big day for the project. I had an appointment to be at the house for the engine delivery and the freight company showed up right on time with a liftgate. In 10 minutes, we had the box in the garage and the top off. No damage and everything looks good.
14 Mar 2007 This may be one of those "why did you do that you dome @&*#@%^$". But with all the stories of having a tough time riveting the cowl hinges after the mount is on, I figured I'd do the hinges based on the cowling measurements and what's in the plans. Too bad there isn't much guidance in the drawings for the cowl! (this photo was taken after the mandatory opening in the lower firewall lip)
  I may later regret the hinge thing, but the first gotch-ya is that the hinge can't go all the way to the radius start on the lower lip. Maybe on the nose-dragger, but not the -7 model. These gear legs get in the way. Looks like it's time to perform the firewall lip mod.
  And here's the mount pretty much in place. I haven't formally bolted it down as my two spacers for the lower center mount points are having the primer dry. I have almost everything mounted to the firewall, at least temporarily and it looks like I can drill the control cable holes without an issue.
     
  12 Mar 2007 Received confirmation that the engine shipped! Woooo hooooo! Pressure is on. I figure that will get hung sometime in mid-April after the panel is powdercoated and re-installed.
10 Mar 2007 Starting to get busy on the firewall in prep for the engine delivery. I ordered the stainless firewall pass-through and got that installed (all except the fire-proof sheathing)....
  And then got started on the engine mount. I'd been putting this off but it's about time. Using the generally accepted method of drilling a top corner first, I mounted the mount in place and used a couple bushings to gradually open up the mount holes in the firewall, finishing with the 3/8" reamer. As usual, the two center lower mounts need a spacer.
  3 Mar 2007 Got the e-mail from AeroSport that my engine should be ready to ship at the end of next week. The firewall forward kit was has been here for a couple weeks, with the exhaust system backordered. That showed up a couple days ago. I figure there's about a month worth of small stuff in the cabin/ fuselage before I get into the engine install.
  30 Jan 2007 I filled out the form and sent a deposit to Aero Sport Power. In another couple months, I should have an engine. At the same time, I sent in the order for the 360-M1B Firewall Forward kit from Van's. Hopefully this doesn't take 2 months.

1 Apr 2006 Other than the battery mount, I think the manifold is the first non-electrical component to get fitted to the firewall. It was kind of low-hanging fruit though. Only took about 10 minutes but figured I'd go ahead and fit it.