Archive for March, 2009

Comm antennas

Monday, March 30th, 2009

My brother helped me install the belly-mounted comm antennas while he was in town this weekend. In the photo below we're lining up the antennas and drilling the mounting holes… much easier to do it with the antennas inside the fuselage than outside:

My camera was low on batteries so I didn't get a picture, but we made doublers for the antennas out of 0.050" alclad. You can kind of see one in this photo:

Since the antennas are grounded via their mounting screws, ensuring good electrical contact is essential for proper antenna performance. I used an alodine pen to corrosion-proof all the mating surfaces:

Here's a better shot of the fuselage doublers, with the alodine drying. It looks blotchy but that doesn't really matter.

I likewise cleaned, scuffed, and alodined the areas of the fuselage floor destined to be covered by the doublers:

Adam helped me rivet the doublers to the floor:

They're also attached to the seat ribs with blind rivets – plenty strong. Each antenna is attached with four screws that go into floating nutplates, and the BNC connector protrudes through the hole in the middle.

Voila, antennas. This arrangement should make for easy wiring, keep the antennas out of the plume of exhaust gunk, and satisfy the radios' requirement for minimum antenna separation distance.

Sick leave

Sunday, March 22nd, 2009

Well… I am just now getting over whatever it was I was sick with for the last week-plus. I missed four days of work last week and I didn't touch the airplane at all until today. And all I did today was string a few more wires, so that's not very interesting.

We also found out this week that Mary did in fact land the postdoc residency she wanted – it's close enough that she'll be able to commute from home, which means we won't have to worry about moving for another year or so. Still, I need to hurry and get this thing finished before the clock runs out!

Garmin G3X Panel

Wednesday, March 11th, 2009

I borrowed some display units from work so I could wire up the interconnections between them. And since it's not a secret anymore (and I have permission) I couldn't resist taking some beauty shots:

It's kind of weird seeing the result of many months worth of effort at home and at work converging in the same place at last. Pretty, isn't it?

Wiring

Sunday, March 1st, 2009

Did some wiring here and there, which doesn't photograph very well. I am starting to run the wires for the three cockpit displays, which you might sort of be able to see if you squint.

I also spent more time on my wiring diagrams… you could say that I am being overly anal about getting all the details right, but my goal is for the schematics to be complete enough that I can come back years from now and not have to rely on memory to figure out what's connected to what.