Life keeps getting in the way of building! I lost two evenings of building this week.

I had to do a little sanding on the wing tubes. The carbon fiber tube is difficult to slide into the wings in fact it would not go all the way in one of them so I used round stock like a closet rod and wrapped the end with peal and stick 120 grit sandpaper. I also glued a soft piece of foam on the end so I did not push the end plug out of the wing tube. Just a few strokes and the tube slipped in better. It is still tight but after about 5 flights it will loosen up.

I needed to open the bottom of the cowl just enough for air to enter and flow through the exhaust tunnel. This will act like a vacuum and help suck the air out of the cowl cooling the engine. I used one of the vents from the kit and traced it onto the cowl. I then used the cut out pieces to re-enforce the cowl between the vents on the inside.  There is no doing this without a Dremel and sharp bits. A steady hand helps too.

Next I drilled and mounted the two piece cowl together. I used 6  4/40”x1/2” screws and blind nuts.  The tape helped line up and measure where to drill as well as keep the fiberglass and paint from chipping.

Before I could say the cowl was complete I needed to create some baffling. The opening is small on this cowl and I need to direct (force) the air going in to go through the fins on the engine.  First I made templates out of thin cardboard. Once I had my design it was easy to just trace it all on to the wood and cut each piece. The top and bottom are 1/8” ply and the sides are 1/16” ply.  I could have used balsa and saved a little weight but I wanted some strength here to help it last. The baffling is epoxied to the bottom part of the cowl.  I still need to add an access opening to the engine airscrews for adjustment.

Next will be the installation of the dual fuel tanks, two 32oz for a total of 64oz of flying time. This should safely get me 12 minutes of flying time.