Monthly Archives: January 2016

This weekend was about prime and rivet the inspection backers to baggage floor, then position and drill for the antenna plates for the right side installation.

Add nutplates and prime with SEM aerosol can.

Top and bottom sides after completion of riveting.

This angle in this photo shows the 9/16″ hole drilled through the baggage floor to allow later access to the step bolt.

Two photos of the inspection plate in position.

Antenna plate for ADSB receiver drilled and clecoed in place.

This angle shows the antenna backer access. Getting to the coax connector and the two hold-down nuts for the antenna itself should be straightforward with this configuration.

These ports haven taken a long time to fabricate, basically because most of the work is being done by hand and I am quite slow with a file.  This results are usually decent for me with this method.

These are the roughed out plates and backers in the left photo after hand shaping and polishing. On the right are both set after initial match drilling the holding rivet and nutplate center holes.

Using the brake to bend a reinforcement angle on the backer plates.

The backer is clamped to an already attached cross-brace on bottom of the baggage floor panel. This serves as the template for the rivet holes and nutplate positions.  The right photo is after all pilot holes drilled and the plate is clecoed in place.

The inspection plate itself is clecoed to the top of the baggage floor to trace an outline hole.

Now for the normal progression – pilot holes, nibble base outline, rough file, finish file, final polish with Scotchbrite.  Again everything is done by hand at this point.

The backer plate is nearly finished.  Adding the nutplates and priming are the remaining step before riveting into place.  These photos are prior to final attachment to make sure the alignment with the baggage floor, cover panels, and step brackets are all good.

The baggage floor panels will eventually be riveted in place, making later access to the step holding bolt or ADSB/transponder antennas impossible. To rectify this situation two inspection holes (left and right) need to be fabricated.  In addition to considering the layout defined by the quickbuild kit, I will make a hole big enough for my fairly large hands.  A hole roughly 5″ x 5″ is needed for comfortable access.

The shows the right baggage floor panel in position just aft of the rear seat angle bracket. Notice the numerous rivet locations already laid out in the quick-build kit. The inspection plates need to avoid the ribs and reinforcing brackets already there.

With the panel out of the plane a proposed inspection port geometry is marked on paper first, then transferred onto .025″ sheet for evaluation.  This picture and the next section show a layout only about 4″ deep, not enough for my hands.  I eventually lengthened the plate to about 6 inches.

The reinforcement plate layout shows the approximate location of the step bolt on the left, and the ADSB antenna fasteners.  The final larger plate should have good access to these locations.

Here I am using another of Rich’s fantastic trickle-down tools (Crafstman Scroll Saw) to rough out the reinforcement plate for the inspection panel.

After the center portion is roughed out, back to hand-filing and shaping on the reinforcement plate.