RV-7 WD-716 canopy doesn't fit

PIC1 - Strapped down frame and skin and fit everything pretty well.


PIC2 - Closed the gap to 0. I'll remove a little at a time to have a nice fit. after this I followed instruction (pretty sure) and drilled and riveted the 614 splice place at front of Wd-716. All still fit well.


PIC3 - Filed away the common interference for clearance.


PIC4 - Wasn't really happy with the low spot at the front center of the canopy skin so I shimmed it up with .032.


PIC5 - Ahhhh that's better.


PIC6 - Filled away the front of the canopy skin to relieve the interference between the the skins. It cam out to 3/32. Not bad I guess. This is the closest I can get without the skins catching each other while opening the canopy frame.


PIC7 - After all that on/off/on/off work I now have gaps at the front of the WD-716 frame. Ughhhh.

PIC8 -


PIC9 - Here you can see the back of the frame sits nicely on the longeron, but the front (on both sides) stick out almost 1/4" at the sides.


I know the canopy build checks your ego and sanity. I still went in knowing that but dang. How do I bring those in?

Give me a call

Carlos,

I feel your pain. Been there done that. I sent you a PM if you want to call me. I might be able to give you some advice.

One thing I did was mount the forward canopy stop on each side this resulted in the subpanel structure being a bit more rigid
Email me and I will send you photos
jack

This is the most painful part of building a tipper.

I will caution you again...Be careful with that gap between the front top skin and the canopy skin as this will sneak up on you and catch when you open the canopy bending the skins and making a hard mess to fix. It can happen even when you are aware of it and watching it.

Every time you do anything to the tipper, stuff moves around. You will think you have it perfect and then the next step throws everything off.

The weldment does not fit the shape of the airplane out of the box. The amount of massaging it needs varies between builders/airplanes. Typically once you get it to fit nice on the sides, you will end up with air scoops at the 10 and 2 o'clock positions.

Good luck and yes this is the right of passage that almost all builders of the tippers goes through. Occasionally someone claims theirs fit out of the box with little trouble....they are rare however.

If its any consolation, the slider has its own set of challenges. But at least it does not leak like a sieve right over the expensive avionics.

I feel for you. I eventually gave up trying to bend and shim it straight. I ended up using fiberglass to smooth it all out. Way too much glass work for a metal plane! Oh, and make the skin gap is bigger than you think you need. Trust me, if you keep it too close, it will catch later and cause some big damage to the skins. Caused more glass work for me.