Work continues on our restoration though it slowed down over the holidays for obvious reasons. I'll pick up where I left off last October.
The canopy is being slowly stripped down to is fundamental parts for cleaning, painting and reassembly. During the course of disassembly, it was discovered that some of the framing is bent, probable as a result of an impact during handling some time in the past.
The myriad hydraulic and pneumatic tubing is being removed after tagging them and documenting the locations and termination points. Mockups are being built at termination points to fasten the various fittings and valve headers so that we can both display these areas and keep track of the parts. Each tube in the below picture can be seen to have been tagged.
My project was to build a mockup of the cockpit floor. The measurements taken since my last post in October were used to create a frame which you can see partially assembled at the Nanton shop below.
Once the sides were installed, we began transferring some of the parts to the mockup. Here's a picture of yours truly sorting out the elevator control cables. If the seat were installed, the backrest/armour plate would be right in front of me with the seat being mounted to the vertical bulkhead that you see here. The unit mounted under my right elbow is the emergency hydraulic hand pump.
Another angle showing the elevator control assembly. The control cables have now been unfurled and pulled through the bulkhead and the elevator trim wheel can clearly be seen. This whole assembly, when properly installed, will be fastened to the bulkhead and floor and fits under the pilot's seat.
Last week, we decided that before going any further, we would paint the mockup so we did that yesterday. I took a cockpit part to the paint store and had the colour analyzed and they mixed up a batch of paint that we then applied to the mockup. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera so will post some pics next time.