All the parts are primed in the morning and in the afternoon I begin riveting the canopy skin. It's not really an easy task, access is quite difficult. Some rivets can be squeeezd, some have to be shot. On the picture, the left row is done with pop rivets except the three on the ends which will be done when the canopy is on the fuselage as there is a gap with the frame. The middle row has no rivets for now as the reinforcement braces will be riveted there. The right row will be riveted later as some shims might have to be installed.




Then I fabricate two guides out of delrin. The canopy is somewhat floppy andduring closing sometimes it's difficult to get the lug into the holes. This guides will guide the lug correctly. Here is the picture with the guide's position relative to the lug, but the guide will be bolted to the rollbar.




And here the guide in front of the rollbar, the right side will be guiding the lug into the square hole.

Work on the canopy goes on. First all the elements get disassembled to allow for the cleaning of the frame. Some sanding is also needed, some places have been roughed up during the building process. The frame now needs to be primed again before the skin and skirts can be riveted.




Then I work on the rear window. I did all the countersink and enlarged all the holes. The holes are drilled larger than the screws to allow for plexiglas expansion under the summer heat. I also did a small cut on the rear. The only work left on the window is the adjustment of the forward gap with the canopy.




I the prepared all the parts that have to be primed.

Today's afternoon I got some work done on the window and canopy. First I get the window of the fuselage and drill the rear skin. I run into trouble when I vegun to dimple the holes as I had drilled them to large. I will have to use the next size of screws (approved by Van's).
Then I tapped the holes on the rollbar, it took some time as there are quite a few holes there.




Then I cut some backing strips to alleviate the stress around the screws at the rear of the window.




Then with Sabine's help we installed the latch lugs. The operation needs to spend some time in the cabin with the canopy closed. After some adjustments, both lugs where correctly in position. Here is one of them.




And a view from inside with the lock engaged in the lug.




I also installed the upper latch handle. This handle also allows to keep the canopy slightly open during hot weather taxying.

Two hours in the workshop only, to drill the rear window. It's easier with some help to hold the rear of the window against the fuselage skin.




After the cut on the front of the window along the roll bar, the canopy can effectively be closed.




The gap between the window and the canopy needs to be adjusted as it is nor even nor straight. I'll do it after the canopy is almost finished as for the time beaing everything moves if the canopy is barely touched.

Today's temperature was forecasted to be too cool to work on plexiglas, so I begun by doing all the small things left on the frame.
First I unistalled the frame and the canopy, and then drilled the screw holes on the sideskirts. This is done from inside.
Then all the holes have to be deburred, dimpled and countersunk.



Then I soved my small problem with the rivets on the sideskirt and forward skin. Here the right side, there will be two small rivets between the bigger ones.



On the left hand side it's a bit easier, I just filed the corner of the angle to allow the rivet to sit correctly.



The canopy is back on the frame after all this operations.



The temperature having reached 25°C, I did what might be the last cut on the back of the canopy.



The frame is back on the fuselage. It seems the canopy is still a bit long (1/32 to 1/16 behind the cut line). But I'll first install the rear window before cutting more.



I then cut the rear window, I still have to drill it and do the cut line at the front.