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Pink Cowl Seam Fit

snoopyflys

Well Known Member
Hi Fiberglass Gurus;

Now the cooler weather is starting to move back into my area, I started to turn my attention to reading, staring and mulling over the cowl fitting on my RV-7A. In the photos below, I think I have the top and bottom cowl somewhat in the position to clear my Whirlwind GA prop spinner (3/16") and close to finished along the firewall. However, the seam line between the halves gets progressively wider (open) as it proceeds forward to the spinner. Here some pics of where I am now;

pxkJGpFSDzC1HJ535tXsxLFTked7_g3E3F9A3gQDJHeMpybzcZuc3-UlKhNy_IHDKK4OaPGCIlg8roEYBqwkWI7Znl7YUUfFSl8ToFn6oc-FomqBuCz1pbfeEpOMo3wJbJjjUJip_R08-X_viCQ4Um-txwsIzt0yTaFnAzY32eCSTHVDLaSDu-FNJWH4WrWg5Jw__WfhBLx3LMhHUbIVry4Os90oCeax76Kkcavz-MGq1f6Cn-MAMgFSQaHvH2tkNCb0AgY_S47Y8_JavqpIpEJZg4HG3nMxkgtbtAmtcZUHcJ7HRbW3tshTn5trhLuZnfNiIAyEMFpskzRyJAmSgIrF72E9AAcqJVDxHUZoqfvPBGRRnQrpo1FMwq0WpHJTuP_rUIncT1KHFBWWEBuWqTz2_QgVF2EWWrmFwI3zQaLImfATLSI94bQlLVHOiTRLKZgcH12uGz4xCImdQMCJQGbLLk65F_MRZGBahm6yrqgWJouBhaY81_iUocgBxCP0e7hbwj9_t3PJXJDx0F8jnBbRys86YeThFZ_8jjEU3QYoUwcgznaoUILRxQgyDRY4Lr0sebRhttpj_fjjbBlTT9DdxhwaSfSOxTJgKeD5VScYLxs-8fXEAOOIV5PdH_euKxnC74b3ts2VCS5Iuem0JWErhH7rzY_00AIZa-fZZu_Akof6GqAf5F6gO9HOxfS7o-pUbvDIOvkesr8pXA=w800-h600-no


I will be using Skybolt VLoc system along the firewall and the cowl halves seams. Since this area needs to be pretty strong, what recommendations and techniques should I use to build up this area that would allow me to install the Skybolt fasteners and maintain the "flushness" of the cowl seams and the the firewall? Or please point me to some past/current posts that have covered this particular topic. I did find some topics by Dan Horton but I just can not get a handle on how to apply them to this situation.

Thanks,
 
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Dan, you're a treasure! I'm cowling now myself, and your posts are some of the most useful things I've read. Thanks for being so willing so share.

+1!! Awesome to have people like this to help the newbies.
 
I'm in the same boat...

Well, I'm one of the folks who has a Superior XP-400. I haven't sold it back yet but that's on my short list of things to do. The reason I'm commenting here is since I'm planning on getting a Lycoming IO-390 to replace the XP-400, I'm not sure if the cowling will still fit. I've got most of the Skybolts on the cowling/firewall interface, but nothing along the sides. I also have the huge gap along the sides of the pink cowl, just like the picture above. Since it's the pink cowl, it also has the billion or so "resin starved" areas all over it that will need filling.

The question I have for the VAF brain trust: Are the newer fiberglass cowls from Van's better that the old pink cowl pieces of crap?? I know I can spend a couple hundred hours trying to fix the pink cowl instead of buying a new cowl. But, if by swapping over to a IO-390 means I have to fill in and redrill the Skybolts along the firewall, and fix the huge side gap, And fix the mismatching inlets, AND fix the billion or so resin starved areas, I rather just spend the money and get a cowling that isn't such a terrible example of fiberglass work.

Sorry if I sound like a whiny child but although the sheet metal parts from Van's are top notch, the fiberglass stuff is some of the worst stuff I've ever seen. I've made my own body bucks for race cars and the parts I've pulled from the molds fit up perfectly. It's a ton of work to do this however. Yeah, I can go and make my own body buck for the cowlings and make the parts from scratch. I can also go out and dig up bauxite ore with my fingernails (no shovel for me!!!), chemically extract it into alumina, smelt it into aluminum by using an old kitchen pot and producing the electricity to do this by pedaling my butt off with a generator on a used bicycle, and finally beating the aluminum into a thin sheet with a rock I found on the side of the road, to produce the sheet used to build the plane. Or I can just buy a kit...
 
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