Progress report

After ordering a whole bunch of pieces/parts from Aircraft Spruce including the SCEET tubing, I've been busy getting the work completed on the kick panels. I needed to shorten the aluminum air duct vents in order to accommodate the SCEET tubing bend inside the panel but now that's all done and it looks good. This should greatly enhance the heat distribution to the rear seats in the winter.

I've also moved the headphone jacks to the center console and placed them inside some new housings (also from Aircraft Spruce) where they make much more sense to be located and look a ton better. I'd also ordered new aircraft-quality jacks to replace the (Radio Shack?) jacks that were previously installed and had broken a few times already, not to mention the noisy connection problems. I've not yet replaced all the jacks but hope to have that done soon.

The pilot-side air distribution box had a broken plastic bracket so I fabricated a new one from some scrap aluminum and pop-riveted into place. Now for the final tasks of getting the pilot side air ducting finished and the kick panel trimmed, drilled, and painted.

Back at it

I've been getting back to the plastic work over the last few weeks. I got the plastic panels exchanged with Plane Plastics and have gotten the passenger-side panel fitted. I found the old CAT tubing used to connect the airbox to the lower panel vents had deteriorated badly so I ordered new SCEET tubing to replace it. I used SCEET instead of SCAT because SCEET has an internal lining that covers the interior wires with another layer so they're not exposed to moisture. Being that these vents scoop in air directly from outside that some form of moisture protection is required. I also found that the air ducts were installed on the wrong sides the last time they were removed/replaced AND the pilot-side air manifold mounting tab was broken which I'm working repairing. No wonder those panels never seem to fit right and the plastic was all broken up. I've got the tubing as well as some other parts on order from Aircraft Spruce. Being that our headphone jacks are simple angled-aluminum pieces, I'm considering whether or not to replace those with some more stable and aesthetically pleasing.
Also, I found that the insulation behind the pilot's side kick-panel was saturated with brake fluid. It looks like the brake cylinder is leaking and dripping down behind that panel. I'll be having the mechanic check it out this week.

Uh oh

For all of the panels so far it takes a bit of fitting through cutting, sanding, or warping but they eventually fit. Not so with the outermost panels under the panel, next to the rudder pedals. The air duct shapes are all wrong on the new panels and there's no way the metal duct covers are going to fit. I'm going to have to call Plane Plastics to see what's up. I'm almost thinking that they're for a different year/model Cardinal. You can see a part of the replaced pilot-side door sill which has to be painted yet. The plan is to paint that black rather than try to match the previous red. It sure would have been nice if the plastic could be obtained in any other colors other than white.

Interior Panels

Once again it's been way too long since I posted. I've been spending lots of time at the airport in the evenings for the last number of weeks working on getting the interior plastic replaced. It's really a very slow, tedious process. All the plastic parts come oversized and require trimming for a proper fit. That wouldn't be so bad if that's all it took but the angles and overlaps of the pieces are such that liberal use of a heat gun is necessary for almost every piece. The easiest piece to fit so far: the pilot's side door sill.
Still haven't found a matching red paint to use for painting those parts that are supposed to be red.
As it turns out almost every plastic part is already a Plane Plastics (formerly Kinze) replacement but is brittle to the point of nearly shattering in some cases. How did the plastic get this way? I've seen comments on various web sites that this may have been caused by the type of paint used but what type of paint would that be? The research will continue.

Fuel drain cover complete!

Well, it's been a while since I last updated this post. I decided to start small and work on the fuel drain cover first. I took the same approach as the fuel valve and used the red Coverite paint followed by the Coverite clear coat. Like I mentioned before it's a bit too glossy but this part is under the seat and isn't normally visible anyway. Below are some side by side images of the before and after parts. I needed to build up the underside of the new part to prevent the pulling of the lower hole like the old cover was. I built it up using cut off pieces of scrap held with epoxy. One down, many to go. The day before yesterday I also trimmed and placed the piece below the rear window, but more on that later.

Placard decals

Today I looked through all the photos of the dash and compared with the set of decals from Plane Plastics to verify we have all the necessary decals. It looks like we do but there may be some variation in the wording and we may have to to some trimming to get them all to fit. The flap settings decal looks all wrong and I may have to cut and paste from some other stickers. Of course, I don't have enough pictures of the fuse panel to be 100% sure but from what I do see, it looks like the decal set will work fine.

I did some research on the internet and sent an email to Plane Plastics about how to keep the decals from shriveling when being top coated. Haven't found or heard anything yet.

Ordering the rest of the interior plastics

We finally got fed up with the rest of the broken plastic inside the airplane. I took dozens upon dozens of pictures of the parts inside the airplane needing replacing, see http://www.webfam.org/Album/phil/Airplane/To%20be%20fixed/index.html to see some of the picts. After looking up the parts on planeplastics.com I had to go back to the airport a few more times to verify what it was I was actually looking at. Finally placed the order on 2/15/09. All parts arrived in a single large box via FedEx. They wouldn’t leave at the door without a signature so I had to go pick it up. Brought the box home, unpacked it, and inventoried and inspected everything. All the parts were molded in white except the dash parts and floor drain cover which were molded in black. All parts seem to be in great shape and well formed except one instrument panel section, the pilot side lower instrument panel that the fuel gauges are in and the yoke passes through. The holes were very roughly trimmed out and it looks like there’s been too much plastic taken off. I’m worried about it not fitting right and having to return it. At the very least it’s going to take some serious sanding on a large, flat belt sander to get it leveled out. All the parts are definitely much thicker than the original plastics which I’m sure is going to cause a fair amount of trimming and fiddling to get it to fit right. I layed out all parts on the carpet and took some pictures. I’m excited to get started on getting the project started.