Fuselage Construction Photos

The fuselage came already painted with epoxy primer. I had to install several Stringers which will give some shape to the fuselage when it is covered with fabric.

09-29-2000  This is one of the first things I did to the fuselage.  I installed the wood floorboard for the front seat. Next I installed the rudder pedals along with the aluminum wear plates. You may have noticed I wrapped the wood floorboard with plastic and put duck tape on the aluminum wear plates to keep them clean and un-scratched. The wood will be sealed and finished later.

This is the back seat floorboard with rudder/brake pedals installed.

10-10-2000  This is the Control Stick Assembly & Installation instructions. You have to match the numbers with the parts breakdown page and just put things together. You can see the Rans drawings are first class as is everything else about their kits.

This is the rear control stick and linkage. The Front and Aft control systems are installed at this time. You have to put every thing together and make sure everything operates in a smooth manner. All this will be removed later for painting.

This is the Push Pull tube for the elevators. This can move back and forth and side to side using the control stick. Back and forth movements will move the elevators on the tail of the airplane. Cables will attach to the welded on tab that stands straight up. When moving the control stick side to side this will control the ailerons on the wings.

10-15-2000  This is one of the Pulley assemblies. This one will handle the aileron cables.

11-25-2000   Well I have been working the last month but not many things to take pictures of at this point. The Rans S7 uses a radiator on the bottom of the fuselage to help cool the engine. This picture shows the radiator mounted on the fuselage. The radiator hoses go up through the fuselage and into the cockpit. You can also see the aluminum cooling tubes that go forward inside the fuselage through the firewall.

This picture shows a couple of things. First you can see how the radiator cooling tubes go through the firewall. Naturally the idea of the firewall is to keep flames out of the cockpit if you have a engine fire. This gave me a lot of problems getting the holes tight enough so I'll be ordering another blank firewall to  re-drill the holes. This picture also shows the Brake master cylinders on each of the rudder peddles. The block mounted on the firewall is the Parking Brake. Of course this is just the fitting stage so all these parts will be removed to cover the fuselage.

This is the aircraft battery holder. It is mounted inside the rear of the fuselage.

This shows the Battery access door. Notice how far the battery is from the door. I'm going to have to get a lot more limber than I am now to get both arms in this small hole and be able to place this heavy battery in it's holder!!

12-04-2000  This is a shot of the deck housing being fitted to the fuselage. This is where the windshield and the instrument panel are mounted. It's not quite fitted yet because I'm still working on the positioning. 

In this picture you can see the instrument panel positioned on the deck housing.

After the deck housing is in place you need to fit the cowling which covers the engine. This makes it necessary to temporarily mount the Rotax 912 engine.

This picture shows how the Rotax 912 is mounted to the engine mount. Notice the three Barry Engine Mounts located on this side of the engine. These are rubber and absorb vibrations from the engine.

12-16-2000  Time to start fitting the cowling. This is one of the parts of the project I have dreaded the most. I have never enjoyed working with Fiberglass. I start itching just thinking about it! The Cowl comes in two halves, a top and a bottom. Both are oversized and must be cut down to fit together. The wood sticks in this picture are used to get the correct space between the cowling and the spinner.

I have the top half in position and you can see how much it needs to be cut down. I had to do this just a step at a time to keep from cutting too much. You can cut More but it's real hard to put it back if you cut too much! 

After cutting and fitting and cutting and fitting some more I got both halves cut down to match. Next I had to cut the length. 

The cowling is fastened with 1/4 turn locks. These pictures show the completed assembly. It actually went much better than I thought it would. I was extra careful and took my time.

Front View!

Side View!

After removing the spacer sticks I found I must have had some tension on the cowling that reduced the clearance between the cowling and spinner. This picture shows how close the cowling matches the spinner. It ended up a little closer than the plans show but I'm Just happy it is in line and fits. I'm also glad I didn't have to end up buying another cowling because of some sort of mistake!!! It's real satisfying when things go well on a part of the project that you dreaded so much.

12-29-2000 The last several days I have been working on the doors attaching aluminum trim that will both seal the door and hold the window in. I am ordering a little thicker Lexan to help cut down on the vibrations. This picture shows how to put a 10 pound airplane in a 9 pound garage. I think I have 4 inches clearance on one side and 3 inches  on the other. the tail is about 2 inches from the wall. I had to reinstall the wings in order to install the windshield. This is what I will be working on the next few weeks while I'm waiting on the new Lexan for the doors.

01-30-01  This is the first step in installing the windshield. After positioning the windshield I used clamps and the red strap to hold it in place. The aluminum strap at the bottom is also clamped into place.

Both sides are clamped and ready to mark and trim. The front of the windshield where it mates with the instrument housing deck had to be trimmed and also the sides at the door post had to be cut 1/32 less than 1/2 of the tube. 

02-04-01  This picture shows all the hold down strips installed and clecoed in place. No holes are in the lexan at this point. The Front aluminum strip is clecoed to the instrument housing deck and the lexan fits in a grove which is part of the housing deck. The strip going across the bottom side and up the door post is attached to a "Z" shaped strip on the inside.

As you see the "Z" strips on the inside rap around the tubes to hold the windshield in place without having to drill holes in the fuselage tubing.

The one piece lexan raps around the windshield and extends over the wings as a green house.  The fuselage has two ribs to attach the lexan. The Clecos you see here are holding the lexan in place on the ribs. About all that is left to do here is doing some trim work and installing the wing cuffs.  The windshield was another part of the project that I really dreaded and it took a long time to get it right. When these dreaded parts are completed it gives you a real boost to keep busy and get the project completed. In other words "All is right with the World -- Again"!!!

01-11-01   This is a photo of the left side door. I have all the trim installed along with the Lexan window. I have also installed all the door latching parts. Now I need to do the same thing on the right hand side.