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Aerowood · 05-29-2016, 08:56 AM

I think the filler looks fine, are you going to paint the that portion of frame silver or ????
I hope you have plenty of help hanging those long side sheets.

truckasaurus · 05-29-2016, 09:27 AM

Thanks Kip. A little reassurance goes along way. Yup I'm going to stick with the POR15 metal cloak silver or whatever they call their especially hard to apply speciality coating. I'm thinking I'll derivet the entire shell just holding in place with pops and cleco's they one by one template the new 22' skins then start replacement at the roof and work down to avoid "accidental" scratches. I wish I could have got some 040" on a coil but 5000' was a bit much

Aerowood · 05-29-2016, 09:40 AM

Is .040 available from Airparts like the .032?

truckasaurus · 05-29-2016, 09:45 AM

Unfortunately not. The max on on coil
Is .032". 040" tops out at 4' x 12' from just about everywhere including airports. I will say they are phenomenal to deal with though they palletized and freight shipped all the way to Saskatoon for less than $200 and I even saved 5% tax as it crossed the border in another province which was another $150 saved or so. I'm secretly hoping that if I use professionally applied spray foam that the skins will look smooth

Trnpk Crsr · 05-29-2016, 10:19 AM

I am in awe. Subscribing.

John

truckasaurus · 05-29-2016, 04:08 PM

Perimeter BP all done. The 3M tape is a real help and I added filament tape to the C channel BP contact points ready for shell time :-)

truckasaurus · 06-15-2016, 05:53 PM

It was insanely windy overnight; kinda glad I tied the shell down to the gantries. It's hard to see but the tail was pushed in and the whole shell moved, still no harm done. I decided to get started on the end caps by giving them a quick clean up (about 5hrs). I need them to be prepped so that when I take them apart to run through the English wheel I don't get any surprises....other than a million dents :-(

I used one 1/2 lb of Nuvite F7. It's my 1st time using Nuvite and I quite like it. It seems to produce a more consistent result than the Jestco system that I have used before. I'm going to try G6 next on the front cap and see what I like best. It's weird but I like the original look that the F7 left, it's got texture and character.

truckasaurus · 06-20-2016, 10:00 PM

There was a bit of shell wrangling required but we got it all tied down. I'm pretty happy with how it turned out, everything fits really tight and just needs to be snugged down more before bolting at the hold downs. Really the only negative is the taper on the belly pan at the front. I think it would be better if it started at the seam, next time maybe :-)

Anyhow here's the pics with the new axle location.

Aerowood · 06-21-2016, 07:03 AM

I agree about the taper, but water under the bridge now. Are you still planning to change the two piece side skins to one piece side skins?

truckasaurus · 06-21-2016, 08:01 AM

I am. I've got the sheet in 5 x 22' and 1 x 32' lengths. I just need the time to drill off the existing panels and template them up. I was planning to do the top (roof) centre strip first and work my way down. (I'm replacing all the skins with one piece copies instead of the current two piece sheet). I might even cut the window opening later but I might think about that a bit more.

Well, I also need to take down the gantries and reconfigure them or get some scaffold as I'm not climbing on the shell whilst it's only held in place at the hold down points on the bows. The extra trailer length does make some activities just that little bit harder.

Aerowood · 06-21-2016, 09:14 AM

I'm sure you are already aware that you will need to support the shell/ frame when pulling the top skin. I remember a crew opened up to much of a 727 crown skin doing a skin lap AD, and the fuselage bowed. We had to remove the engines, put a special jacking fixture in the #2 position, remove the nose landing gear and install another jack fixture, crib on both side of the wing, and then do some creative jacking to line everything back up. I think the whole procedure took about a week.

truckasaurus · 06-21-2016, 11:33 AM

Yup that would be bad. I'm thinking I'll place six jacks, L, R, front, axle and rear and see what happens. It would be nice to run temp strapping inside on the bows but without a shear I might have to brainstorm some more. I'm still mulling over the front BP and might try again as much as a I dread it.

truckasaurus · 07-02-2016, 07:54 AM

OCD kicked in. I couldn't look at the weird belly pan taper without trying to make it right. I released the forward side skins to get the front three panels off to get the belly pan free. We're replacing all the skin so it just accelerated the schedule a bit. I'll replace the three panels up front with a one piece skin like my Overlander had; it just seems more sleek and logical.

truckasaurus · 07-03-2016, 07:08 PM

It came out way better this time :-) A nice smooth transition from the side belly pan to the tongue.

I'm glad I didn't settle.

Next weekend it'll be time to start on the skin.

Atomic_13 · 07-04-2016, 08:36 AM

Nice work. Significant improvement.

Aerowood · 07-04-2016, 09:19 AM

That does look better. Unfortunately I won't be working on my small GT again this summer as my brothers and sister and I are renovating our family cabin (much needed) this summer.

truckasaurus · 07-06-2016, 02:08 PM

That's a shame. But you'll still be around for advice? ��

Aerowood · 07-06-2016, 03:02 PM

Yup

truckasaurus · 07-17-2016, 07:42 PM

I squeaked a couple of half days in this weekend so most of the rivets are out. I even put her on the street just to get a visual and I quite like the look. She dropped the tundra 1 1 1/4" at the bumper which I feel is good.

I roughed the wheel well cut-out layout up to switch up to Ohio style and did a little photo retouching just to get a feel for the shape. It's hard to balance some of these changes but when I get bigger tires and rims on I think it'll work.

I'd still like to see it with the bumper on but I don't fancy buying or having one made up just yet. (I also can't settle on narrow body new aluminum 5", profiled 1960's steel 4" or custom bent made channel, 6").

I took a few measurements and I'm pretty pleased with 14 1/4" of clearance under the frame especially as that's front to back between the suspension arms.