My RV7 is not the Oskosh show winning baffle installation, but it is in decent shape. Still, I've had cooling problems in the hot weather, such as reaching 400F CHT before I'm ready to level out during climb. I've checked fuel flow, tried various baffle and cowl tweaks that I've read about here, and finally a nice guy told me to check out AntiSplat while I was chatting at Sun n Fun.
I ended up ordering one cowl flap, figuring that I could get another if I needed it. It was easier than I thought to cut the hole with the template. I used one of those vibrating cutters with the half-moon fine tooth attachment. I was a little worried about crushing the cowl with air hammered rivets, but used soft, flush rivets and it was pretty easy with a mushroom head on the rivet gun.
The hardest thing was soldering the wires on the DPDT switch, which was pretty tiny for my eyes. But I made it work, and used shrink tubing to cover up the exposed terminals after soldering. Drilled 2 small holes, one for the switch, one for the blinking LED light, and hook to a small fuse or breaker. There's a small inline coupler near the cowl flap so that you can drop the cowling when you need to. I wire tied that where I could reach it with the top cowl off.
The little light blinks when the cowl flap is open, and doesn't blink when it's closed. It closes perfectly flush, and seems strongly made. Even better, the temps on climbout also tell me that it's open! Difficult to tell exactly, since every day in Spring here is a different temperature, but I'm guessing 20-25 degrees less on ALL cylinders, maybe more, because I've been trying to make it heat up in order to test it......whereas before, I was always powering back, flat climbing, etc.
By choosing the starboard side, it also helps cool the convoluted gascolator area, which, I suspect of causing me some vapor lock symptoms after a heat soaked stop.
Thanks to the gent at Sun N Fun who told me about this. And thanks to you guys who recommended putting screws on the bottom cowl, they have also worked well!
I ended up ordering one cowl flap, figuring that I could get another if I needed it. It was easier than I thought to cut the hole with the template. I used one of those vibrating cutters with the half-moon fine tooth attachment. I was a little worried about crushing the cowl with air hammered rivets, but used soft, flush rivets and it was pretty easy with a mushroom head on the rivet gun.
The hardest thing was soldering the wires on the DPDT switch, which was pretty tiny for my eyes. But I made it work, and used shrink tubing to cover up the exposed terminals after soldering. Drilled 2 small holes, one for the switch, one for the blinking LED light, and hook to a small fuse or breaker. There's a small inline coupler near the cowl flap so that you can drop the cowling when you need to. I wire tied that where I could reach it with the top cowl off.
The little light blinks when the cowl flap is open, and doesn't blink when it's closed. It closes perfectly flush, and seems strongly made. Even better, the temps on climbout also tell me that it's open! Difficult to tell exactly, since every day in Spring here is a different temperature, but I'm guessing 20-25 degrees less on ALL cylinders, maybe more, because I've been trying to make it heat up in order to test it......whereas before, I was always powering back, flat climbing, etc.
By choosing the starboard side, it also helps cool the convoluted gascolator area, which, I suspect of causing me some vapor lock symptoms after a heat soaked stop.
Thanks to the gent at Sun N Fun who told me about this. And thanks to you guys who recommended putting screws on the bottom cowl, they have also worked well!
