Anyway, here I put the UHMW tape on the inner surfaces of the canopy latch brackets, where the latch levers rub.
I dimpled the rivet holes for the latch brackets using the pop rivet dimple dies. The duct tape is just on the puller for a rainy day...that's to protect various surfaces when riveting in close quarters...no applicability here.
I shot and bucked the rivets attaching the angles to the side skin and installed the latch levers. Here it is in the canopy latched position.
And here's the canopy unlatched position. I know, we've seen pictures of this before, but now there are no clecos, so why not.
Here's the inside. Nope, I opted not to prime or paint this stuff. If I do paint it, I will mask it off and do it later. But I'm starting to think I might leave various stuff unprimed. I've been trying too hard to make things look "finished" so that it's potentially more inviting to people who are used to most GA spam cans with upholstered-everything. Screw that. I like the rough, purely mechanical look, so you might start seeing more unpainted stuff.
Here's the canopy skin flipped upside down. I put a 1/2"-wide strip of UHMW tape along the front edge, where the skin theoretically rubs the top of the forward fuselage top skin. We'll see.
I clecoed the skin to the canopy frame through all of the match-drilled holes.
The next step is to drill the skin to the bar/tube that runs along the rear of the frame, but there's a fit issue. There's a good 1/4" gap here where the tub drops out of the natural curve a bit sharply. It's just a crappy fit the way it was welded. Other builders have reportedly had this same issue.
