Firewall

I'm almost done with the last bulkhead of chapter 4! I've finished the firewall except for the last layer of bid on the fwd side, and cutting the temp firewall (which might wait until I'm in ch.6).

I cut the firewall out of 1/4" birch on Monday night, and cut and installed the 1x1x1/4" alum. inserts for the engine attach points on Tuesday night/Wed. early a.m. How early? Ask Julia - the power tool section of the project (cutting the alum., cutting the holes for the alum.) didn't wake her ~ forgetting to close the garage door and lightly tapping the hard points into the birch however, did. Sorry! To ensure a good bond with the birch, I sanded the aluminum with 60 grit sandpaper and epoxy to prevent any oxidation before installation and fiber glassing.

Here's the 4 piece section of the firewall with alum inserts installed:

And a detail of the alum. inserts:

For the 14 blind screws, I drilled the holes after glassing one side and cut a countersink:

I did diverge slightly from the plans after reading about problems of having the screws turn later on. After looking at either cutting a cross shape into the screw head or installing piano type wire inlaid into the screw head and birch, I decided on the cross shape.

Here's what it looked like:

And after installation with flox:I should be able to glass this side this afternoon before I go to work as my wife has a wedding rehearsal to run tonight. Chapter 5 will have to wait until the 6th of June however, as I start my week on tonight. If I finish up the firewall tonight, I'll probably post the requisite "all bulkheads together and in position pic.