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.

Today, I begun installing the sideskirts. The two aluminium skins are riveted to the siderails of the frame and will clamp the sides of the canopy. here the rear of the right skirt.



Here the forward part of the left skirt. The canopy skin will have to be adjusted. The skin will also have to be cut where the skirt is overlapping. Normally the skirt should not be overlapping, but I pulled the skirt a bit forward to try to minimize the size of the small triangle shaped opening at the bottom. It was not a good idea as some rivets will now interfere with the frame rivets. Some innovative thinking to do about this.



With everything installed, I tried opening the canopy. Without the braces and the struts, the canopy is very floppy.



To help opening the canopy I fabricated two small handles made from some aluminium angle.

Today I did all the drilling on the canopy. There are a quite a few operations to perform. First the siderails and rollbar get drilled and deburred. The holes are not drilled to full size. Then the canopy is put back on the fuselage. On the picture, the siderail and the holes visible through the canopy.



The same for the rollbar. The canopy will be screwed to the holes on the green tape. The small holes in the back will be for the rear window.



The drilling is done by aiming the hole through the canopy. It's not that difficult.



Then holes have to be countersink with different depth between the rollbar and the siderails as there will be a skirt on the side.
On three holes on the rollbar I had some problems, with some chips on the holes, but no cracks. I countersunk a bit deeper and smoothed out the hole with my dremel. I think it will be bearely visible once finished.
Then I drilled all the holes to final size, and deburred everything.



After having put the canopy back on the fusealeg again, I marked the cutting line on the back of the canopy. I'll have to cut 1/2" on the top and 1/8" on the sides.

Today afternoon I cut the sides of the canopy. I do it slowly I don't want the sides to be too short. After a few iterations I'm happy with the result. I also sand a slight bevel to the front so it sits a bit better on the skin.
I the sand the cut line with smaller grit. Today I finished with 320 but after the final adjustement I'll go to 600.



As all the tools are out of the box, I also cut make the big cut on the rear window.