I countersunk all the rivet holes in the fiberglass aft skirt:
Where the 1/8" rivets will attach the skirt and plexiglass to the frame, I am going to use #4 tinnerman washers under the rivet heads to keep them from eventually working through the fiberglass. Once it's all painted, you won't be able to tell they're there.
I drilled all the remaining holes in the skirts and cover strips up to #30:
I also countersunk the line of rivet holes along the side skirts where they will be attached to the frame with flush blind rivets:
I cleaned all the aluminum parts and got them ready for painting:
Outside, I laid down a plastic tarp (weighted down with my entire collection of bucking bars) and commenced priming and painting the interior surfaces of the various canopy skirt pieces. I'm using Rustoleum flat black enamel throughout the inside of the canopy, to keep the glare down.
The inside surface of the fiberglass aft skirt also got the black paint treatment:
I scuffed up the powder coat on the canopy latch handle, cleaned it, and sprayed it with black paint too. In this photo it's sitting on a nail driven into a board, which is why it looks like the Oscar for Best Canopy. I'm debating whether to paint the canopy frame and rollbar myself, or send them out to be sandblasted and powder coated black. This piece will help me decide which is the best way.
A big stack of canopy pieces is now painted black. I'm like a regular Mick Jagger.
While waiting for successive coats of paint to dry, I enlarged all the holes in the canopy plexiglass. Each hole that will receive a 1/8" pop rivet has been enlarged to 3/16", and every hole that will get a #6 screw has been drilled up to 1/4". This is more aggressive hole-enlarging than the plans call for, but I have a strategy… you'll see.
I enlarged the two holes through the canopy where the exterior handle bolts to the frame, drilling them up to 7/16" with a unibit. Scott had previously made me some neat little aluminum spacers for this application, but through experimentation I found that a stack of washers worked just fine (sorry Scott – I still owe you anyway).
Here's an approximation of how the exterior handle will attach, using some nylon washers I had at hand:
I do believe I'm finished cutting and/or drilling the sliding canopy, and no cracks yet. Huzzah!
