From the Maplewoods workshop: Steve's RV7 project: Fairings

Work continus on the "targa strip": the fiberglass transition between the front plexiglass windshield and the sliding canopy. Shown in the first photo is the peel ply laid up after the last of the fiberglass and microballoon layers to smooth the surface and absorb the excess fiberglass.

Peel ply

After the microballoons are added, hardened and sanded

Next, Mike, my older son, and I, worked on the wooden gear leg stiffeners. While not strictly necessary, these decrease the likelihood of wheel shimmy on some landing surfaces, and I didn't want to have to add them later. On the other hand, since I made them a bit on the wide side, I wanted to make sure they were "in trail" aerodynamically, since their position will affect the ability to position the gear fairings, which go on next, and the gear leg fairings NEED to be perfectly "in trail". Otherwise, they act as canards, and can affect the lift and steering of the plane.

Wooden stiffener. Made of straight grain Douglas fir. Attached with two layers of fiberglass.

The gear leg fairings are installed. Per Wally Anderson's preference, they are epoxied at the trailing edge, rather than installing a piano hinge. This photo shows the system to check that they are aerodynamically aligned with the centerline of the fuselage, and therefore (hopefully) in line with the airstream in straight and level flight.

Fuselage is off the ground, mimicking flight condition of gear legs

Trailing edge of gear leg fairing is halfway between strings.

Now that the gear leg fairings are on, the wheel pant fairings can be installed. These have to be aligned to the centerline of the fuse, to be level when the fuse is level, and to have the appropriate camber to match the angle of the wheels in an unweighted situation. The photo shows a ruler measuring the offset of the center of the front of the wheelpant fairing from a chalked line parallel to the fuselage center line, and that it is the same as the offset of the trailing portion, that both are level and (not shown) that the fairing follows the angle of the wheel. Also one needs to keep a one inch separation over the top center of the wheel to the inside of the fairing. (This is achieved by taping a one inch thick spacer to the top of the tire when fitting the wheel pant fairing; again, not shown)

These photos show Wally Anderson's suggestion for keeping the gearleg fairing from twisting, until the intersection fairings to be installed later, lock them into position. The expanding foam is "Great Stuff" from Home Depot.