Getting the fuselage ready took several days. I sanded the surface smooth to 120 grit and then decided to fill any of the large gaps and dents with very dry micro. While the plans say to do this when you do the layups I find the micro gets diluted by epoxy and sometimes doesn’t fill the dent as intended. I then sanded again after cure and finished off with scotch brite.

I was also thinking ahead that the fuselage layup would be a long one and the less to do on the day the better. I coverd the inside of the tub with plastic and spread this on the floor and used lots of masking tape. The plan being to reduce or eliminate any drips of epoxy where it is unwanted.

I initially cut the glass for the first two plies on one side but it was so difficult to drape the cloth on the fuselage to get it positioned that the next pieces I just made hugely oversized and will have a lot of scraps over. I feel this is worth it rather than risk making distortions in the cloth that are hard to remove.

I also cut peel ply and planned out the 3″ wide strips for the top longeron area on both sides that will be wetted out on foil. I planned peel ply for the entire stake area with a view to fuel resistant epoxy later and probably a very light skin of glass to hold it.

Micro gap fill

Glass cutting

More glass cutting