Chapter 4 - Step 4

This covers the building of the front and rear landing gear bulkheads. These are made from H100 PVC foam.

Laying Out the Foam January 1, 2000. Using print outs made from a CAD file I layed out the templates for the three landing gear bulkhead parts.

Cut Foam January 1, 2000. Here are the three parts cut out from the foam. Two still have the templates pinned in place so I can properly place the hard points.

Preparing Hardpoint Layup January 3, 2000. All the materials are ready to do the 22 layer layup. The green is just holiday saran wrap.

Weighting Finished Layup January 3, 2000. After the layup was completed I covered it with more saran wrap, some wood, then a pile of phone books, and a saw (in the black case).

Cut Layup January 4, 2000. The completed hardpoint layup cut square in preparation to cutting out the four pieces. This layup will be scrapped for a new one. This came out too thick and I decided to do it over so I can be sure I am doing the layups correctly.

Hardpoints in Place January 12, 2000. The new hardpoints are epoxied in place on the bulkheads. Notice the first hardpoint layup on the table.

Stuck Masonite January 15, 2000. Here's a dumb thing - I layed a piece of masonite over the peel ply so the weights wouldn't stick. But the masonite was stuck real well. I first tried scraping and cutting away at the masonite with a utility knife. This wasn't working to well.

January 15, 2000. Here is all the masonite removed. I ended up using a wood chisel. This worked MUCH better. I got it all off in about an hour with virtually no damage. I only made about three small scratches during the whole process. Lucky.

Forward Bulkhead January 18, 2000. Here are the completed halves of the forward landing gear bulkhead. You can see the holes drilled in the hardpoints.

Upper Forward Bulkhead March 19, 2000. Update: Here is a close-up of the upper portion of the forward landing gear bulkhead. I have had a few people ask me about the bevels on the horizontal edges so I added this picture to help clarify the issue. The face you can see is the forward face.

Aft Bulkhead January 30, 2000. The aft face of the completed aft landing gear bulkhead.

Aft Bulkhead January 30, 2000. The forward face of the completed aft lading gear bulkhead. The ears look darker here than on the aft face because it has 8 plies instead of 3.