I worked on a small variety of items today. I tried out some plastic razor blades to remove the plastic coating from the aluminum sheets used for the fuselage. They had become very stick and brittle over time and I needed to find a way to remove them. Due to the brittleness of the plastic it would immediately break off in pieces when I tried to removed it. Using the plastic razor blades and a heat gun on low I was able to carefully scrape off the plastic without damaging the aluminum. I’ll take some pictures next time.
I also spent some time working on the canopy latch. I am using the stock latch design as per the plans and the small tab the protrudes the canopy did not seem secure riveted with two cherry or pop style rivets. I decided to drill out the rivets and use solid rivets. This seems to make a much stronger connection. I think the setting of the rivets allow them to expand and completely fill the rivet holes resulting in a tighter connection.
I order the seatbelts today and looked at the fasteners securing the canopy to the frame. Next step is to shorten up some of the fasteners using ones I had previously ordered.
Dave's Sonex Builders Log 