Friday, May 13, 2016

Section: 18
Hours: 1

The green balloon didn't stay inflated overnight. I pumped the tank up again and spayed soapy water around looking for the leak. All I could find was a leak at the balloon. Here's the bubbles around the balloon neck.

I had tried tie wraps and electrical tape to secure the balloon to no avail. I also tried looping some wire around the electrical tape and twisting it to clamp it down but that leaked also. Finally I thought to use some rubber strand (FAI contest rubber for indoor model airplanes) looped, stretched and tied off at the end of the balloon. Rubber from a rubber band would probably also work. I pumped up the tank around noon and the balloon is still inflated this evening. All my tank leaks so far have been at the threaded fittings, the gas cap or the test apparatus. I've been a little anal about pursuing this, but I really don't want to chase down gas leaks after the tanks are installed. Much easier to address any leaks while I have full access to the tank. Hopefully tomorrow morning the balloon will still be inflated.

Section: 20
Hours: 4

I started work on the bottom skins. It looks like they are going to fit very nicely with a very small gap to the leading edge skins.

I finished up the edges and final drilled the holes for the 6 access panels and started work on the ADAHRS mounting plate. I'm not sure if I'll be actually putting my ADAHRS on this plate- I think the Garmin ADAHRS can be mounted on the panel in the cockpit. I'm going to install the plate anyway to fill the holes in the bottom skin and maybe it will be useful for some other purpose later on.

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