Ch 23 Engine Installation

Date:  02-06-2024

Number of Hours:  9

Manual Reference:  23

Today’s work was about getting the right radiator secured and hanging, seemingly in the middle of nowhere.

The rad is now secured from the auto pilot server case and a P-Clamp going to a tab on the top of the radiator. I’ve had several tabs just spot welded on after I positioned them. This keeps my progress going instead of waiting for the final welds to be done which might be a week or more. The airport welder was VERY helpful in doing several of these tabs of angle aluminium I’ve made up.

This is the first tab which goes to a clickbond on the firewall. I did this a few days ago and its worked out OK.

This is the servo mount stay. I’ve put this forward of the rad top and the next fixing is towards the back. I’m trying to give the set up more stability. If its a little loose now, imagine what might happen in flight.

You can see the hose clamp on the engine mount going directly to a tab on the left of the picture..

This is a second tab to the engine mount way in the background but very necessary. It is pretty hard to get to. I’m making a puzzle box it seems.

This is yet another stainless steel stay on the new tab welded on today. At the top is a P-clamp on the mount again. This little short one made the whole rad a lot more stable.

I like this shot for some reason.

This little one really stiffened up the assembly.

Here’s an overview. There is no fore/aft movement but just a little side to side still. I intend to join the two radiators (when the left one is delivered) near the middle and that might sort the issue out. It is close to rock solid. I can certainly start on the carbon fiber ducts from armpit to radiators now.

Date:  02-05-2024

Number of Hours:  6

Manual Reference:  23

Here we go for the almost final securing of these exhaust pipes.

I wasn’t happy with the movement with just two stays so it had to be a third one. You can see the triangle shapes so it has to be secured right? …and it is now rock solid. We do have just a tiny bit of wiggle left and thats what you want to prevent the pipes from cracking. Maybe I’m wrong and they can flop around more. The amateur engineer in me just didn’t like it.

I’ve tidied up the fittings a little. I’m sure they will come off and on a number of time yet. I am still waiting on the new machined shoulder bolts but the old ones are fine for getting things in place.

I did have to make a new bracket just another hole width towards the outside now I have two stays on the same fitting. The nut is pretty close to the injector but they are NOT going to touch, both are very rigid in place.

I hope I won’t see any cracking with these angles. If I do I’ll convert to angle fittings and an extra fastener set. This stainless is very strong, it should be OK as is.

Now over to the left hand side where I had just one stay. I’ve added a new rocker cover plate and one more upright stay that was a bit tricky angle wise.

The engine case fitting has been tidied up.

This bend is no accident. I wanted the angles correct so the hold on the pipes was ‘relaxed’.  It took a bit of doing. It is attached to the outside at the top as I have minimal clearances on the inside of that bracket…without making a bigger bracket.

Its pretty small and tidy here on the rocker cover plate.

Overall I’ve never seen stays on the end of the exhausts on a 4 pipe Long-EZ as I have here. Well I make no excuses, this is what this particular build needed. Most people seem to bracket or secure the pipes off the air cooling baffling. I don’t have any of that stuff given that this is a liquid cooled beast.

 

Date:  02-04-2024

Number of Hours:  12

Manual Reference:  23

My exhaust ends move excessively. They have slip joints at the engine but of course they need securing at the ends as well. I took a video of the movement and sent it to the exhaust manufacturer. He replied that this is normal but I also need to stop lateral movement. He suggested something that attaches to one of the rocker covers.

Easier said than done.

Hers the first support I made. As much a poof of concept as anything else. Its about 10mm diameter stainless steel pipe with the ends squashed to make a fixing point.

This is closer up and its working quite well. It has stopped the side to side movement but we still have a lot of up and down.

These weird things are ‘shoulder bolts’. I need ones with a longer shoulder to fix a plate onto that cover. I spent some time online and ordered what I though were the right ones and then waited a few days. What arrived were long enough BUT the thread was smaller. I thought I had it right. I ended up going to a specialist bolt place in person to discover the size I want is unavailable in Australia. Great…

I did buy the correct thread and shoulder length, its just that the shoulders are too wide. The very skilled machinist at the hangar is going to make the required adjustments. My $2 bolts are going to cost a bit more now. The up side is that I can keep working even if the old bolts don’t engage fully.

It took a bit of work and two tries to get this plate to fit.

After a clean up it looks better. The connecting support pipe also took a couple of tries. I was going to use a 90 degree bracket but it was a problem getting something in stainless, I have plenty of angle in aluminium. I don’t see that dissimilar metals here at the hot end is a great idea. The rocker covers are aluminium so nothing is ideal.

Here we are all in place. It is better but I’m still not happy. There is a bit of up and down movement despite the two supports. Given we have a slip joint at the engine end I think this opposite end of the pipes should be super solid. It looks like I am going to need a third arm onto the plate. Depending on what interference that has, I may have to move the pipe bracket down and inch or so. This would mean I have to remake the two existing brackets a little longer. The ones that I just finished today. So be it.

Meanwhile on the left side I just have one bracket at the moment. I’ll have to make a similar rocker cover attachment plate and hang from that for the second ‘arm’. This side is shorter due to the offset cylinders and the pipes have far less movement. I may be OK with just one more bit of stainless rod here. I’ll just make one and give it a try. Experimental aviation is all about the wiggle sometimes.

 

Date:  02-02-2024

Number of Hours:  25

Manual Reference:  23

With the right side radiator back from ‘Rod the radiator guy’ I can have a look at how I’m going to mount it.

This time the AN-16 and AN-12 fittings which are on the front side have had the end tanks reduced to the minimum possible size. Once the core arrived, although slightly shorter than ordered by 1cm, we then only need the tanks for the fittings. This gives me an inch or two to play with up or down in the cowl/engine space.

You can see the fittings are just tack welded on as are the tanks for now. Working with Rod I have learnt that this build is a fluid thing with minimal clearances. So it is better to go gently into ‘final’ positioning.

The line on the bit of tape is the longitudinal center of the tank or the optimum place for trying to get an even spread of air. One of the challenges is that its only 4″ or so away which is not enough space to use a full KW trumpet duct. I’m going to have to get creative.

This is where the radiator has to go. It sort of hangs in mid air in the middle of nowhere.

This has led me to some new ‘tech’ or rather a new method of fixing for me and a new material to work with, again, new for me. Old news for everyone else. I like to think its another arrow in my methods quiver.

Sure, this is not new to everyone else. Its just stainless steel pipe and squashing the ends to make fixing points.

The pipe I started with was a bit large in diameter and it took a lot of squishing.

In fact it required so much force that I broke the vice! Was it my new exercise regime or had I applied the law of the lever from the Greek scholar Archimedes? I’d like to think the former but I suspect a long bit of pipe over the vice arm had a bit to do with it. I bent the vice arm as well.

Needless to say I’m now using a bigger vice with smaller pipe and a few days after this ‘incident’ I have replaced the old vice with a nice new one in my hired corner of the hangar. It wasn’t my vice to break.

This is the ‘tech’ I’m using. I first tried it on securing my exhaust pipes which is another post. This however is very applicable to ‘hanging’ the radiators.

My initial try on securing the exhaust pipe ends. The first pipe shown was just bigger than necessary. The new tube is lighter and easier to crush. It is still awful to drill. This stuff is amazingly strong and you have to be careful not to work harden it as the drill bits don’t like that at all. Yeah, everyone else but me knew this.

After a lot of thought I’ve decided that the radiators must hang from the spar and the engine mount. Items that don’t move. If I hang from the engine I will be in a world of hurt.

Here you can see I’ve mounted a simple click bond which will become one end of a stainless steel support rod.

I did have an issue with the quick release of the aileron arm and the autopilot connection. Lets just say this gobbled up the best part of a day unnecessarily. However I did find a penny washer that brushes against the wing root side and I’m addressing that. These things have to get fixed. Every time I find some anomaly it takes a lot of effort to resolve but I do get a deeper insight into very subtle methodologies specific just to this plane.

Here you see the first support arm in place. I got lucky and had the airport welder just tack on the bracket for me. This saves going to my welding guy and back again and probably losing a couple of days. I hope the local guy has time for several of these as I go along. Note that one flattened end is at 90 degrees to the other. This is a great way to have an easy direction change.

Getting the radiator in position requires little pieces of foam with the bottom cowl on to ensure that I have clearance all around. Each time I move something I have to set it all up again. It really is hanging in the middle of nowhere.

Here you can see me working on the second support arm. I’ve made a bracket that spans two of the servo clickbonds and then bolted the stainless arm to that. Now we just need a bracket welded to the radiator.

Here’s the bracket position.

This is another view. You might see I am trying to ‘triangulate’ where possible. If the angle of the flattened piece isn’t quite perfect…I get to make another arm. Its a good thing the stainless pipe is cheap.

The second bracket above will attach to a P-clamp (aviation standard, not the hardware store type)  on the engine mount. They are hot glued on for now with scratches to help positioning for the tack welds. I hope to get those done in a couple of days. The positions are critical of course. I’ve done these two on the edges to help with stabilizing the radiator left to right. There will be at least one more fitting down the end onto the engine mount. At that point I will see if it needs anything else to secure it. It’s very much shake it and see. I want a rock solid mounting.

 

Date:  01-20-2024

Number of Hours:  30

Manual Reference:  23

This post is a few words on what has been more than a full weeks (7 days) worth of work. I’ll just hint as some of the many things I’ve done although there is not a lot to see.

Not shown are a lot of wires under the plane. Pretty much all the EFII wiring is loosely laid out now. I have the spark plug leads connected to their blocks but I won’t terminate the ends until a lot of other things are done. The idea was to at least lay out wires and put them roughly where I think they will end up and connect it all at the firewall. I expect they will get moved as the coolant and oil pipes go in. At least I have an idea what I’m up against.

Oh and I connect the two MAP lines and spent a while running one into the rear cockpit to the fuel regulator. One of many little jobs I didn’t even photograph.

You might see above that the top coolant lines have been reversed as I worked out a run where these go under the engine and then join up at the firewall to go into the top of the two radiators. Once I did this the rear fuel line needed to move a bit. I had to buy more fittings and then move clamps and add rubber buffers. All good.

Then I got one of the radiators and found that the top outlets needed to go back to the other side again! What you see above is my amended pipe run that now needs to be changed again.

The other part of the equation was that I’ve also bought a -12 to -16 to the pump fitting as a tee rather than the Y I had planned. This is for exit from the lower radiator outlets. Trust me this will work. As ideas come, and I keep buying more fittings the pieces are starting to fall into place.

So here we are with the top pipe back to a right angle fitting and a much straighter run. I showed this small part of what I’m doing to say I have 4 or 5 similar things on the go. Back and forth ideas and trial fits.

Now this looks ‘right’. The fuel (black colored) pipe is well supported and has a couple of rubber buffers where it almost touches the top of the engine. Chafing is not an option.

Here you see where the top engine coolant line are now going on a very direct short path to the top of the radiator/s. We have -16 fittings for this part. Now the two fittings with holes are 1/8 NTP. One will take a temperature sensor and the other will be a -6 hose to the expansion tank with the radiator cap.

I am thinking I might be able to tap a thread in one fitting and have two things coming off it. I may save the weight of one fitting which is nothing but good. However it lines up beautifully for the hose if I leave it as is. Like so many things I will play around for a while and the answer will come.

OK now for the big news. I have one of the radiators. This is how I’ve been able to advance a bit on the hose/pipe placements.

It is pretty much the same size as my now well worn dummy. The ends are just tacked together as we all know there will be changes. In fact I’m going back tomorrow with a short list of alterations.

Contrary to my drawings and explanations both in/out fittings were on the same side. However this mistake has really worked out perfectly and I need to let ‘Rod’ know that I want the remaining one done the same way. For once I was lucky. I am going to see if we can now get the tanks ends made smaller.

The weight of this unit is a hefty 4lbs 15ozs (14.8oz to be exact). It is however necessary and the thickness is required given such a marginal surface area.  I spent a few hours playing with positions of course and thinking about how in the world am I going to mount these things! I have a couple of ideas. I need to mount this right side one before I can start the duct to the air inlet in the lower cowl. The placement is critical for a good fit. I didn’t know this was the first job until I had the radiator in my hands. This is how it works for me.

 

 

 

 

 

Date:  01-19-2024

Number of Hours:  4

Manual Reference:  23

This expansion (or header) tank has been back and forth to the welders three times now. Tomorrow when I take it back again will be number 4. I think they might be a bit sick of seeing it. I bought the tank online. Its well made but needed a few tweaks to fit my plane.

On the third try the radiator cap is now low enough to fit under the cowl. I had previously mounted it to the spar with three click bonds.

I was going to tilt it forward for the sides to now clear the cowl but in doing so I run out of thread. The real problem is that when ‘Rod the welder’ did it, the tabs were not flush with the back of the tank. That tiny step gap really stops it fitting, he wasn’t to know. The margin is REALLY tight. So I had to get the three tabs off and try to fit it myself.

I used an angle grinder very carefully and then with minimal welds left I prised them off and then cleaned it all up. That was a good 3 hours work.

Next I bolted just the brackets back onto the spar clickbonds and dry fitted the tank. You can see the tongue depressor spacers to help get the minimum clearance possible.

The cowl went on and off a few times. With the torch you can just see that this position has the tank well clear of the cowl. Well clear enough anyway.

I then added metal epoxy to the tabs. Checked and rechecked and let it cure overnight. The next day it came off the click bond posts easily and I just spent an hour cleaning up the glue on the tab edges.

It now needs Rod to weld properly where I have the glued pieces. Then the overflow spout is still on the wrong side. We had a ‘miss communication’ twice on that one. Once this is sorted out I think I will have my expansion tank pretty much ready for more fittings and hooking up in place.  I also need to find a spot for the overflow bottle and then find a bottle the right size. The tank however had to be in a high point above the radiators to help prevent air getting trapped in the coolant pipes.

Date:  01-15-2024

Number of Hours:  6

Manual Reference:  23

The air fuel sensor has a little control box that needs to go somewhere. I was thinking the hell hole but it really is tight and access is terrible. I’m thinking I have room under the seat and the cable to the box is long enough.

After some consultation I cut the wires going to the red box. I’ve had to make an access hole in the firewall of course to get the wire through. Its a smaller hole without the plug. The other end of that plug is the big black connector and that goes on the hot or engine side so I just had to feed the cut wire through.

This is roughly where the sensor goes on that angle. The fitting needs to be welded in just right or the cowl won’t go on! This is the position which is enough information for when we do the wiring. I’m trying to at least have all the sensor positions known so that when Simon, the wiring guy, is available we know the run lengths we need.

I think the box can go here.

I first added two clickbonds to the planes floor. It seems like a bit of overkill. I could have just used a bit of velcro. I am making an effort to think about possibilities and consequences…ohh well, that means doing things properly.

I could have done a better job with the glass wrap here, not so ‘properly’ eh?  It was a bit of an after thought. I glued the right angle tabs onto the plastic but it just didn’t seem that secure so I added the wrap. It really needed the edges beautifully transitioned in micro with a separate cure before doing this. What I have done is strong, just not pretty.

Here we are all in place. Another tiny little job that took a lot of thought and too much time. Its done now and in the past. I only go forward.

Date:  01-08-2024

Number of Hours:  7

Manual Reference:  23

The next step for the alternate air was to try out the linear actuator that has just arrived.

I’ve used hot glue to try different positions. The switch is to give a cockpit indication that the door is OPEN. Otherwise I might accidentally activate the switch and never know it and so letting unfiltered air into the engine. The other thing is if the switch is mechanically triggered I know that its working and the door is open. I’m told those actuators can fail in time so it means this will be on my occasional checklist and certainly at 50 hourly intervals with the oil changes.

Here we are working with the hot glued parts in place.

I’ve epoxied the fittings in place. Unfortunately it was not perfectly aligned but still seemed to work. If I have problems later I know how to fix it.

After a clean up the parts are certainly well secured. I’m always thinking of engine vibrations in the back of my mind.

I tried a bunch of ways of securing the little reed switch. In the end KISS one. If it needs replacing one day I’ll just epoxy on another one. No tiny screws to undo.  I spend quite some time getting that opening dialed in. Its pretty close to the area size of the RAM air opening so I am VERY confident its big enough to supply air to the engine at WOT.

Here we are with everything in place for final testing.

As you can see it works and I added a view of the engine as well. This little video had 13,000 views on Facebook 21/1/24. Probably a lot more by now. Airplane guys had a lot of comments too. I thought an alt air door was pretty standard? I just don’t have room for another mechanical cable in the cockpit so maybe the fact its electric is of interest.

It works…on to the next thing.

 

Date:  01-01-2024

Number of Hours:  7

Manual Reference:  23

Alternate air is required in case the induction air is blocked for some reason. The most likely is ICE! I guess a really messy bird strike, a plague of locus or volcanic ash are other possibilities where the air filter becomes blocked and the engine gets no air and stops. Ice however is a real possibility and an engine out would add to a bad day.

Alternate air in my design bypasses the air filter and takes warm air (without ice) from around the engine and gets it down the induction pipe to the throttle body.

Some systems are automatic allowing the engine suction, if the incoming air is blocked,  to open a reed valve or membrane of some sort or via a spring loaded door. This has to be just right with a LOT of testing or unfiltered air might sneak into the engine during ground ops.

I have settled on a pilot operated sliding door via a linear actuator (currently on order)

When I made the U pipe I had it a bit longer so I could save some ‘pipe’ as spare material. Here I’ve cut up a piece for the door.

To set the door up I’m starting with a longer piece of pipe to be the mold for side and end rails. First up I’ve covered the piece in duct tape.

Here I’ve overlaid two plies of carbon. Once cured all I have to do is get the mold piece out.

It took a while but I have my ‘window’ and sliding door cleaned up.

Here you see it partly opened. I’m still going to use the smaller piece, the larger was needed to make to side bits and in case I had to destroy it getting the thing out.

Here’s a quick video of the slide action. Obviously I’m going to be cutting a huge hole underneath the door. I’m going to wait for the actuator and do some tests before I make the cut, just to be sure its all going to work.

Date:  12-30-2023

Number of Hours:  10

Manual Reference:  23

This might seem like nothing, but it has gobbled up a few days! Just securing wires here and there.

Right in the corner is a clickbond with two pies of glass holding the yellow wire. Just out of shot and too hard to see anyway is another one… that I had to do twice!

Here’s another.

One more in the hellhole. Those wires are big and a good foundation to secure smaller wires to later.

Here I’m double P-clamping as well as making a bracket that I folded on the brake. It all takes a while.

I’m very keen to ensure this critical trigger wire is secured as well as the joining fuel pipe. That one has the double clamps and some baffle material cable tied to ensure no rubbing given it is almost sitting on the cylinder block.

I’ve also been busy with changing over the brake fluid reservoirs as one was leaking to a better design. The throttle-body plate with MAP connectors has been fitted as a final item. Numerous other small jobs have been happening that are not worth a photo. Enough to say I am at work daily (including Xmas and New Year’s day) moving this project forward.

Date:  12-25-2023

Number of Hours:  3

Manual Reference:  23

Sometimes you see something that you are not happy with and you know it will come back to bite you one day. So you need to fix it. Better right away than nagging at the back of your mind. While working on the hoses I noticed that the wire at the back of the standby alternator was almost touching the hatch cover.

I had a allowed for this but by the time some RTV and foil had gone in, the gap had quietly closed. So all the vents that had been finalised with torque seal and buttoned up had to come out again to get access.

You can see with things out that white wire on a plug at the back of the alternator? This is what needed just a little more clearance.

I could barely get a pen on it from the other side to ensure I was digging in the right place. I had allowed for this, just not quite enough.

I went right down to the point where I was just breaking through the plywood. A reasonable depth, otherwise I would have needed to add to the outside.

Given I had gone through, a ply of glass was needed to lock things together. Of course I also needed to get the paint off first.

Once cured, primer and top coat. Yes I am probably the only person who will ever see this.

On the other side I just added a solid but thin coat of RTV which is proven to work in a fire as a barrier.

All the ‘stuff’ then went back in.

Here’s a view from the engine side. Its hard to spot but I am finally happy with the clearance for that one white wire. Time to move on.

 

Date:  12-23-2023

Number of Hours:  22

Manual Reference:  23

There is a bit going on here. As I continue this hose business I’m covering a few ‘hold down’ tasks. If not now…when?

The left side cockpit return line fuel hose seems to hang in mid air so it needed a standoff that allows the hose to remain straight. This is a piece of blue foam carved to shape with a click bond on top and then two plies of glass.

After a bit it was bonded to the side which had paint removed first of course. Some glass around the base and then a little grey paint.

While obviously not done up you can see a good fit for the P clamp and then I did two slots at the end for a rubber faced reusable cable clamp. This was the easy side. On the right I’m still thinking how to do it with the main power cables, control pushrod, wiring and other stuff all in the same place.

I have gone to quite some trouble to get the right fittings for these hoses. Above is a regular straight fit.

This lower fitting is angled. There are 30, 45 and 90 degree options in this ‘Speedflow 200’ line.  While they are not cheap, its a tidy way to minimise the bends in the hoses as much as possible. Teflon lined, these guys don’t like to bend too much, unlike the all rubber type. Keeping the fuel (or air) flows as smooth as possible with minimal sudden direction changes is also a goal with this install.

Again more trial fitting, this time with the fire protection cut to size.

This joins the two banks of injectors. I’ll be using standoffs and whatever works to secure the lines every 6 inches or so.

I don’t like how the hose is almost sitting on the engine here. I might add some rubber or the RTV impregnated glass I’ve made up for this sort of thing and sit it over the fittings.

Now this batch of hoses are sized and all the ends fitted they need to be tested. Again I went to 1000psi for at least 60 seconds on each hose. They are all fine.

I tried to get the special aviation dip for sealing the fire sleeve ends but none was available. I am NOT buying a few hundred dollars worth of stuff to only dip 8 ends. RTV will have to do.

Ready for installation.

Here I’ve added stainless steel straps to secure the fire sleeves. This was a bit of fiddling around and I did buy a special tool. The type of straps I ended up with self lock. So like a cable tie as you pull it through they say put. I just needed to get them tight or lets say, ‘firm’ and then cut the ends off. I gave  a few hammer taps where the ends were just to make the sharp end sit down.

You can see here how I looped around the spark plug to ensure access.

This is a bit hard to see but it was SUPER hard to connect at the engine end. There is a restriction fitting on the -4 line right next to the left top engine mount. Connecting it was a few hours including reshaping a spanner to a minimum head size!  In the end I took off the ignition block. That then gave access, I should have started with that in the first place.

This sensor is for oil pressure to the G3X. A lot of mucking around required! You can’t quite see where it goes on the engine. To see it you really need to take the engine off and I’m not doing that for you. Sorry!