October 31, 2004

Wasn’t really sure what I was going to attack today, until I got to the hangar. I decided to start looking at the canopy. Gulp! Well, it turned out that the hardware bag for that was also on back order. Anyways, I managed to start the roll over bar. I read the instructions for the roll bar and it all seemed pretty straight forward….

Here I measured the pilot holes and drilled them on each side…

Then came the trial fit… Oh deary. A half inch too wide. So, I needed to squish the bar in a fair bit. Well, in the instructions, it said that it was ’easily done’. Easy my arse. The first attempt at bending the bar involved me bouncing up and down (off the ground) with all my weight (a measily 165lbs). It moved about 0.00000006". Joyous.

The next attempt was inspired by the ancient catapault devices used to blast down fortress walls. I used a piece of wood just long enough to catch the roll bar. I managed to tweak the bar in quite a ways using this method, although it was a bit dangerous to say the least! Anyways, the bar was squeezed in about 4 inches in the picture. When it was carefully released, it just sprang right back to where it came from! Now, did I read correctly in them there instructions that bending this thing was easy?!

Attempt number three involved a similar strap idea, but this time a ratcheting one. We figured that we could apply more pressure in a more controlled manner and in a somewhat less dangerous way than the ancient catapault technique. Well, loading up the bar was fine. Letting it go was a whole other story! Here I am reefing the strap tighter and tighter…

Here I am pondering the consequences of a strap snapping with all this potential energy stored up!

We reefed this so tight, it HAD to bend the damn bar. We pulled it in a good 5 inches. The whole bar dropped into the plane where it was supposed to sit on the top! Well, now the problem was getting it undone. Mike, Cameron and Larry didn’t want anything to do with any of this, and I really wasn’t sure what to do either! Then, I had an idea. Use the old crate from the finish kit to unleash the thing. Cameron had the camera, and I put the bar in the crate. Then from the other side of the crate side, I flipped the ratchet open. Man that thing just blew apart! Cameron managed to get a pretty good shot of the strap flying off…

The result of all this was… Yep, you guessed it… Nuthin. Nowt. Zero. Not even a sixteenth of an inch. Can you believe that? Me neither. So in the end, it was a case for the blow torch. Or two blow torches. I’m gonna repaint this thing the right colour anyway, so who cares about the finish? So, heat away… Here are the weapons of choice…

I put the bar in a vice and heated away with it lightly strapped to preload the bar. The key was to get the bar glowing a bit. After this was done on both sides of the bar, I took it out and found it had gone wayyyyy to far. Bloody typical. So I carried it around to Mike’s hangar and got Mike and Cameron to pull on it while I heated it. I needed the extra muscle, as I’m nowhere near strong enough for this kind of thing!

Here it is, finally sitting in place, cleco’d down. Fits pretty nicely now. All I need to do is get the thing stripped. Mebbe get in blasted with baking soda to strip the powder coat off it.

Next up is the brace. I popped the top skin on briefly in order to get the length right. Then I cut it to length. Good to go. Next task will be to drill the holes in the bar at the top for the brace. Not today though, I have to go eat and get ready for a football game. (Soccer to the Americans out there.)