Aug 24, 2022     FLIGHT #6 and #7 - (5 hours)       Category: Project

I wont delay the suspense.... SUCCESS! As they say in the world of comedy, TIMING IS EVERYTHING!

The advice I got from the multitudes at OSH ranged from 1) I already killed the engine to 2) Just keep flying, it is still breaking in!. After fliying flights 4 and 5, I decided something was still not right and wanted a new set of professional eyes on the timing. I found that Terry McRoberts has an engine shop at HAO and he was probably the one that worked on this engine when it was worked on in 2010 at Signature. The engine is somewhat of an unknown. It was built by Don's Dream Engines in 2005 and the data plate does not indicate much about the engine except that it has 9.2 pistons. The engine sat for 5 years when Roger decided he wanted to change the cam to one with oil holes or something like that. Signature changed the cam and while in there found a few things they did not like and fixed those. The engine, at the time, has a LASAR ignition system in it. When we got it, there were not mags at all.

While I am not a mag timing expert, I was there and witnessed the timing after we returned from OSH and we believed that we were something less than 25 BTDC AND the mags were synced within a fraction of a second. This change improved the CHTS but not nearly enough. We then did some baffling work and that also helped a tiny bit but again, not nearly enough and the temps were still above 420 on climb at reduced power and reduced fpm.

I did a short flight on Aug 12 which was a cool Friday morning and the temps really jumped AND I smelled fuel. Pulled the cowl and found a fuel leak at the input to the fuel flow transducer and a major fuel stain on the bottom of the cowl. Not good!!! Fuel dripping very close to the exhaust pipes.

Fixed the fuel leak and flew but still had the temp issues. Looked at the recordings and we had 16.6 GPH at full throttle. This number was confirmed by two other IO360 drivers but some suggested that I should be seeing 17.5-18 which seems high for a 360. Again, advice coming from everywhere.

So....to the fix. I was going to fly the plane to HAO and work with them but decided to ask Mark Day of Blue Ash Aviation to help me out and he went above and beyond for me. Mark checked the timing and while one of the MAGS as at 25 BTDC the other was way advanced and totally out of sync. I mentioned that when we timed them, they were at 24 and in sync. Mark and I pulled the MAGS and Mark checked them out on his off day last Friday. On Monday, I worked remotely and Mark fit me in to his schedule and reinstalled and retimed the mags. Mark reinstalled them on Monday afternoon and we retimed them using his digital angleometer (if thats a word). We set the timing to be about 24 bTDC and mags were synced well. Mark also noticed that we had some chafing on an oil line due to close proximity to one of the lower baffle ties. Good catch on that as it was not obvious to the untrained eye.

We did a test run without the cowl and the engine ran the best it ever ran. Idled well and I was able to lean normally CHTs sitting there were 300 or below. I decided it was time to put the cowl back on and fly!!!.

Don was on the ground again as my safety pilot and I took to the air. First thing I noticed was increased take off performance as the plane leaped into the air. The next thing I noticed was that ALL THE CHTS were UNDER 400 and Stable at full throttle climb at 800fpm. What a relief!!! Took the plane up as high as I could with the cloud cover and "played" around. At 23/23, CHTS were under 390 and decreasing and eventually settled at 350-365....WOOHOO....Ill take it..

I decided to explore the flight envelope a bit more and did a couple of maneuvers that added some Gs. I pulled close to 3gs in a pitch up and immediately heard something rattling. I was pretty sure it was the root fairing rubber strip on the bottom as they did not fit snuggly. I immediately decided to land and also realized that I forgot to put the protection for the oil line in place so landing was the right move. Flight was short but SUCCESSFUL!!

That was Monday. On Tuesday, Aug 24. 1) Mark suggested that I change the oil since it was pretty dark which could have been from the high heat. I changed the oil with 8 fresh quarts of mineral oil, attached the loose molding strip with some gorilla tape and put some protective rubber around the lower outboard baffle ties. Did a thorough preflight before putting the cowl back on. THIS WAS GOING TO BE THE FLIGHT when everything worked as intended and it was!!!

Climb at 1000fpm at full power pushed temps close to 400 but only #3 got there at 402. Reduced power and all temps came down under 390 and at 23/23 temps were below 370. During normal cruise, temps were 365ish and any reduction in power settings resulted in lower CHTs.

Did some leaning tests and found that to be normal. Did some 3 G testing looking for the G meter to pop up. Looks like it pops up at 2 Gs and stays there for a bit. I would like it to stay there if possible and will look at seeing how to do that. It was close to getting dark so I set up for landing and at 4,000' MSL over the airport, did the stall series to see where the speeds were. I felt comfortable doing this now that the engine is performing properly.

Found stall speeds to be 47 no flaps w/ slight right wing drop, 46 10 deg w/ slight right wing frop, 46 20 deg w/slight left wing drop, 45 40deg . Stalling with slight left wing drop. Noted that the elevator "feels" funny at the stall break. I am not sure if it unloads or loads at that point. Just feels different in the feedback to the stick. Will examine in future flignts. Published stall speed by VANS is 58 mph and if I do the calcs, I am seeing 54 on 321CX. I think my EFIS is reading 10% low on IAS and I am not sure how to fix that but that would make sense since my IAS at cruise seems slower than I am actually going. Note the picture showing 200fpm climb and a speed of 110 at 23/23 which seems a bit slow

Total flight time now about 6 hours. Oil looked clean after the flight and almost impossible to read on the stick. I will check tonight and see if it has darkened at all and then try to understand what that means. Hopefully it remains clean. Oil usage is minimal at this point so it is possible that we are broken in. I will run 10-15 hours more on the mineral oil and if oil consumption is normal, I will changed to philips 20w50.

Finally, I spoke with John Lebarre ath EAA 974 chapter meeting and he showed me some interesting pictures of his engine breakin from the inside. Prior to breakin, you could see significant oil running by the rings after running the engine. Once the rings seated, the oil that would get by after running decreased dramatically. This was viewed with a boroscope.

  Aug 24, 2022     Flight #3, #4 and #5 - (2 hours) Category: Project

Aftec. BREAK IN FLYING FOR TRIP TO OSH (In my Citabria)
1. Started asking lots of questions of everyone I could find. Lycoming, Superior, VANS and the average pilot on the street, an engine cooling seminar and 2 hours session at Lycoming on engine disassembly AND fuel injection explained in detail.
2. There were two schools of thought. School 1: Engine has high compression cylinders (9.2 vs 8.5) and high CHTs should be expected until break in is complete. Just keep flying it at as high a power setting as possible. School 2: CHTs are way to high and I may have shortened the engine life which I did not want to hear.
3. All experts said to make sure to check all baffling and sealing of the baffles with RTV. Said that timing could have an effect on CHTs (we had set the timing at 25 deg BTDC which is the normal setting for Lycoming engines)
d. Flight 3: Short flight. CHTs went as high as 480 on one cylinder and decided to land immediately. Bad news is that the CHTs were high. Good news was that my third landing in the plane was a 3 pointer.
e. Break in flights: Check timing and baffling
i. Decided to check the timing and we found that it was more advanced than 25 and after working with the timing for a while, we reduced the timing to 24BTDC.
ii. Also did some rework on the baffles to make sure that the baffles were sealed at the inlet ramps. We decided to try and stick the baffles straight up beside the inlet ramps and seal against the top of the cowling.
iii. Checked all seals and checked for leaks and replaced the cowling.
f. Flight 4: Best flight yet and getting closer to the RV Grin.. Almost 1.5 hours
i. Take off was nominal and this time concentrated on keep the nose down to maximize airflow. Maintained 500FPM which, due to the slope of the forward part of the fuselage, feels like the plane is almost level
ii. CHTs rapidly climbed to 450 until reducing power to 25 sq. CHTs continued to remain high so reduce power to 23 sq which started to reduce the temps.
iii. Was able to climb above 4000 ft with temps remaining under 440. Upon leveling off and staying at around 23 sq, CHTs stabilized between 415 and 420 for 1, 3, 4. 2 remained in the “normal” range and in cruise would always stay around 380. As soon as power is reduced and or start a descent, the CHTs come right down.
iv. Performed some steep turns and added a couple of positive Gs to get a feel for the elevator and turn performance.
v. Trim remained centered for normal flight. The left aileron does train down by about 1/8” and the plane flies hands off this way. At some point, I will adjust the aileron up a by one turn of the heim joint.
vi. The plane has very little adverse yaw but does require minor rudder inputs to remain truly coordinated but most passengers would not notice if rudder was not used.
vii. Don and I attempted to find each other in the air to get some speed checks but we flunked flank and were not able to get together. Mostly due to the fact that I really did not want to come off the throttle to allow him to catch up.
viii. Don's plane seems to be faster and that maybe due to the wheel leg fairings in place. I plan on working on them next and get them installed. Some of the advisors suggested that we get the fairings installed to reduce drag and get more airflow in the cowl at a given power setting.
ix. 4th landing was best yet. So getting the sight picture. N321CX floats abit at 75kts IAS so I will be slowing to 70 with 20 degrees of flap.
g. Flight 5: Prior to flight, made some additional changes to forward outside baffles and was able to get them to confirm to the inlet ramps by putting a slot in the ramp to all the baffle to tuck in and get the edge out of the airflow. Temporarily secured them with tape. Also adjusted the right tail pipe as it dropped down a bit. After landing, the pipe returned to the same place. I will do some work on the hangers to fix this issue. The tail pipe never touched the fiberglass but it needs to be fixed.
i. Flight was done on Saturday morning in an attempt to fly in reduced OAT. Almost 1.5
ii. Getting more comfortable with the plane and paying more attention to takeoff roll, power and general control.. Plane gets off the ground so fast, there is not a lot of time to think about it.
iii. Don and I were able to get side by side and do some speed checks. Looks like 321CX might be reading 10kts low but I will have to double check this.
iv. I am not really executing the EAA flight cards at this point because all I am trying to do is to get the engine broken in and the CHTs to get in line.
v. Landing was a roll on. Luck is with you some time and I could not tell when I transitioned from flight to 3point landing.
r returning from OSH,

THE CHTS REMAIN TOO HIGH AND WILL NOT FLY AGAIN TILL TIMING IS CHECKED.

  Jul 20, 2022     Final Inspection and Airworthiness Certificate - (7 hours) Category: Inspection

On Tuesday July 12, 2022, Stan Faske from the Cincinnati FSDO along with a trainee showed up at our hangar at 9:45am and we got started. While I was nervous about the inspection and had spent the weekend preparing, I was confident that everything was in order. We had removed the top tail fairing, wing root fairings, cowling, inspection panels, floor boards and top rear baggage cover.

The inspection was thorough and professional. Stan was very helpful and provided a wealth of information which gave me the confidence that the plane was, in fact, ready to fly. The inspector did find some small issues including two missed cotter pins and a bolt on the lower rudder hinge that was not protruding through the nylock threads.

Upon completion of the inspection, I was awarded a temporary Airworthiness Certificate and Repaiman Certificate for N321CX.

After repairing the issues discovered in the inspection, we spent the rest of the day working on putting the plane back together. Along the way, we discovered that the ELT battery was missing in the remote box. When we replaced the battery, we had trouble getting the system to go through a self test. We tested the remote cable and it looked like everything was in order yet it would not test. We ended up putting the ELT back in the plane and set it to the armed position. I had a hand held tuned to 121.5 and upon arming the ELT, we heard the warble and requisite beep indicating successful testing of the unit.

Next Step: FIRST FLIGHT

  Jul 14, 2022     SECOND FLIGHT - (5 hours)       Category: Project

Don, Steve R and I did a bunch of research, called VANS, talked to Mark and asked anyone we could to determine if the high CHTs were an issue. The general answer was that a new high compression engine will run hot and 450 degrees is not out of the question during break in. Still seemed high to me but this is what the research showed.

We decided that we should change the oil and filter and make certain the engine was filled with W100/50 mineral oil.

We checked the baffling with the cowling on with a borescope and then removed the cowling to check for any other cooling issues. We did not find anything related to the baffling or cowling which left only friction and fuel as possible culprits. There is no way to really modify the inlets on the RV7 and there are no cowl flaps (I wonder if that would help).

So, Don and I changed the oil and filter and did a test run that showed no leaks. Put the cowl back on and waited for the clouds to dissipate as the evening wore on. At 7PM, we decided to fly with outside temp in the upper 80s and Density Altitude approaching 2800ft. These, as it turns out are not optimal for a new engine and we will try for cooler mornings for future test flights.

Don agreed to be the ground crew for this flight and after thorough preflight, I taxied out to the runup area and performed a normal runup. Taxied to 19 and back taxied to use the full runway and prepared for takeoff. Oil pressure, oil temp, fuel pressure were all good. This time, take off was fully intentional and I kept the climb angle lower to gain airspeed.

CHTs climbed but stabilized in the 440-450 range and as the climb continued, the hit 460 on one cylinder. I reduced power to 23 inchs and 2300 RPM and continued the climb and while the CHTs were high they appeared stable. The number 2 cylinder was never went over 400. In the end, I climbed to 3500ft and at 22/23, I was able to keep the CHTs in check. .

Aerodynamically. the plane flew well. The left aileron trails slightly down by 1/8" in straight and level flight. Pitch, roll and yaw were all well coordinated very responsive and not at all twitchy. I did load the plane briefly in a steep turn and it felt stable. Flew for 1 hour and then did a stall test (49kts with a slight break to the right while Don was getting dizzy on the ground watching me run circles around him. See the picture to get a view of the flight path.

Finally, I Set up for landing #2, CHTs immediately reduced and the landing was nominal although I could have used more up elevator. The end of the flight was good but next time we will wait till cooler weather.

  Jul 12, 2022     FIRST FLIGHT - (2 hours) Category: Project

ON JULY 12, 2022 at approximately 8PM, N321CX took flight for the first time. After successful FAA inspection in the morning, reinstallation of all inspection covers and fairings, complete reinspection and cowling installation, we prepared for first flight.

Start up was normal and we let the engine run on the ground for a period of time to make sure all seemed good. Let the oil temperature warm up which did not take very long given that the outside temp was close to 90 degrees. Winds were stronger early in the day and were predicted to decrease toward evening and that is what happened which provide a perfect opportunity to fly the plane.

I don't know about anyone else that has performed a first flight on a plane they built but there was a lot going through my mind. What if the ending quits? Where would I land? Would I try a turn around maneuver? What if a flight control did not work properly? What if, what if, what if? I knew that I was a capable pilot and that I could handle the plane if all things lined up and worked properly but there was still a lot on my mind.

Once the runup was complete, I pulled onto the runway and took a deep breath and advanced the throttle. Shortly after reaching full power, there was a significant surge from the propeller so I aborted the take off. Rudder control in this circumstance was excellent and I back taxied and returned to the run up area.

I did an additional runup and cylced the propeller and all seemed normal. I again announce my intentions to depart and pulled on the runway. As I advanced the throttle, the engine was smooth and there was no surge from the propeller and before I knew it, I was airborne. It was the "before I knew it" part that bothered me after the flight. I always believe that flight should be intentional but with all that was going through my mind and everything in the green, I was flying, albeit slightly ahead of my intention.

The plane felt solid and controllable with no obvious roll or pitch issues. Airspeed was indicating about 85ikts and I did not observe the rate of climb but shortly after starting the climb, the CHTs on 1,3,and 4 all spiked to over 440 degrees and that alarmed me. I immediately radioed the ground crew and told that my intention was to reduce power and level off at 1300 ft. Reducing power to 16 inches and remaining level, I was able to keep the CHTs from continuing to climb but they did not reduce either.

The flight plan card for the first flight called for a reversing 180 at 2000ft AGL and then a climb to 5000 AGL to get a feel for the plane, practice a couple landings at altitude and then bring it home. Since the ending is new, we really wanted to run the engine hard for at least 1 hour but with the CHTs the way they were, I decided to land and airplane that I had never landed before nor had I explored the stall and slow flight.

In the end, I relied on my instinct around how the airplane "felt" and kept the IAS below 80 for flaps and gave myself plenty of time on final. After circling the field 1 additional time after the first circuit, I set up for downwind. Added first position flaps and then turned base and added second position flaps. Flew the last part of the final at about 75kts which "felt" right. The landing happened, again, slightly before I was ready and there was a small bounce that was tamed with aft stick and the rollout was uneventful.

CHTs immediately reduced at the lower throttle settings and taxiing back was good. After shutdown and moment of reflection in the cockpit, we celebrated our achievement. Now it was time to figure out why the CHTs were so high and if that was, in fact, an issue.

  Jul 11, 2022     Engine Tuning and Other Prep for Inspection - (30 hours)       Category: Engine

This will be the last or second to last post before inspection.

1) Rough engine issues
a. We had been experiencing various get and cht variations on cylinders. The most recent issue was with cylinder #4 with high EGT and then a cold cylinder.
b. We spoke with two mechanics (Mark and Jason) and along with our fuel flow tests which you can see from the weights of the cups in the pictures it was determined that the flow divider was the problem and that we should get it rebuilt.
c. Don and I decided to take the flow divider apart and then did a good cleaning and reassembled.
d. When removing the top of the divider, we found that the screws were not really tight which could have been a contributing factor but there is no real way to know.
e. After reassembly of the divider we did a test run and had EGTs within 6 degrees and CHTs were good as well. So it seems that the flow divider just needed to be cleaned.
f. You can see the status of the sparkplugs in the pics
2) Spinner
a. Did final fit of spinner
3) Compass
a. Installed wet compass
4) GPS Ant
a. Installed GPS antenna on glare shield with Dual Lock adhesive Velcro
5) Completed all necessary items on punch list as you can see from the white board picture
6) Completed Weight and Balance for first flight
7) Completed all paperwork for FAA
8) Saturday July 9, 2022
a. After doing a complete inspection of all components and installing the wet compass and gps ant, we decided it was time for a fast taxi test
b. Inflated tires to 38PSI
c. Taped Brake lines
d. Installed Cowling
e. Pulled plane from hangar and started it and it ran great
f. Ran several taxi tests and confirmed the following
i. Airspeed alive
ii. All engine indicators in the green
iii. All electrical indicators in the green
iv. Rudder control was excellent with center lock working properly
v. Rudder is sensitive and the plane is a bit more “twitchy” than the Citabria
vi. Performed several runs up to 35kts with no issues and full controllability
vii. Brakes performed properly
viii. CHTs and EGTs were all good with #1 cylinder running a bit hotter but well within parameters
9) Sunday July 10 – We will be removing all inspection panels and floor boards and fairings in prep for inspection.
10) Inspection is July 12 at 10am.

  Jul 11, 2022     General work on Cowl, Spinner, W&B - (40 hours)       Category: Fuselage

June has seen a LOT of progress as you can see from the pics, we are getting close. In fact, FAA INSPECTION IS SCHEDULED for 7/12/2022 at 10am!

1) Weight and Balance
a. We hand pumped all the fuel out of the wings and then drained the remaining from the fuel drains
b. Using jack points on the wings and the adjustable table under the tailwheel, we place scales provided by Steve R under each wheel
c. We zeroed the scales and set the plane down on them
d. Using the adjustable table, we made sure that the plane was level laterally and longitudinally using levels
e. We temporarily placed the wheel fairings to take them into account for the final weight
f. The results were fairly consistent as you can see from the pics below. The final weight considering wheel pants and fairings and all the inspection panels came in at 1063lbs which is quite light and I am happy with the weight.
g. 321CX weighs almost exactly what Don's plane weighs and his prop is 28lbs lighter than ours. He has a nose wheel and maybe the slider canopy is heavier but regardless, this plane is pretty light. Could have something to do with the avionics.
2) Spinner
a. Started the spinner installation
b. Using templates from Hartzell, we cut the main cutouts for the blades and we got it pretty close
c. In the end, we were off on the 180 degree mark by a couple degrees and some adjustments will have to be made to get the two sides the same
d. Originally, I thought is was going to be difficult to get the spinner on without it wobbling but, in the end, putting the spinner over the front mounting plate and making it flush with the back of the backing plate solved the problem.
i. Manfred, on his plane, did his this way and told us that there is very little room for error since the spinner must go over the front plate and then be flush on the backing plate.
ii. You can see our very expensive indicator (piece of plywood on top of the tripod) that we used to look at runout. It is next to nothing. It is really hard to turn the prop without moving the plane but we think it is pretty good.
e. We will be working this coming weekend (July 2) on the spinner completion
3) Wheel Bearings
a. Tested wheel bearings and repacked the left one
4) Added labels to fuel caps
5) Got vinyl letters cut for No Step and N321CX and will apply this weekend
6) Did additional engine runs and this is where things get a bit interesting
a. We ran the engine and wanted to “drag” the breaks which is part of the process of getting them ready for flight
b. While running the engine, we had different issues with cylinders not firing properly.
c. First it was #2 some time ago but that one seemed to be fixed after we cleaned the injector
d. Then it was #1 and same thing, seemed to be fixed once we cleaned the injector
e. Then is was #4 so we….you guessed it, cleaned the injector but this did not solve the issue
f. We put cups undier the feed lines without the injectors and got very similar flows from all 4 feeds
g. Don and I could not find any issues so we decided to call in a pro (Jason – from TJs shop)
h. Jason looked at the engine and we did a flow test with the injectors on the feed lines and this time we got a little less on #4 which would make sense since it was running lean
i. After an initial run, we did not see improvement and then found that the sparkplug spring was missing on the bottom plug.
j. We also swapped 2 and 4 injectors to eliminate that as the issue.
k. Next run up as high as 2450 yielded the smoothest run yet but then #4 dropped off again………darn!
l. At this point, Jason suggested that we pull the feed lines from the spider and blow them out.
m. When Don and I did our little test fuel flow, we did find some very small pieces of debris but seemed to have flushed it all out.
n. Next we will flush the lines and try to run the plane again.
o. If we cannot get the lines to run consistently clean, we will likely replace the fuel spider. Mark Day indicated that the diaphragm in the spiders can deteriorate and since this engine sat for 10 years, that could be the issue. It is like having a bad float in a carberator.
7) Added wing walk tape

  Jun 02, 2022     Notes for 6/2 - (1 hour) Category: Project

There is a punch list in the hangar and it is getting shorter
Looked over all wiring and tied up some loose ends
Found we did not counter sink the holes for the 2 access hatches screws
After hand counter sinking found that the dimples in the hatches were not the right die
Redimpled the screw holes with the proper #8 die
Deeper dimple required deeper countersink
After smoothing the edges, Attached both hatches with stainless steel screws
Vacuumed the fuse
Installed all floor boards and spar covers – required a couple hours of RV Yoga for me and James
Found that the screws for the pump cover were #6 and got some from Don' hardware supply
Close that up on Wednesday 6/1
Canopy work
Steve R did some sanding and then added two skim coats of glazing for pin holes and sanded
We primed after that and still had some pin holes
Steve P added more glazing (not nearly as neatly as Steve R) and sanding it almost all off
Reprimed and then sanding with 500 grit paper. (Looks pretty good)
Installed a P-seal on the front lip of the canopy and HMWP tape on the bulkhead to allow for a no slip fit
Added a handle on the pilot side of the canopy
John (from the FBO) and Don and Steve P then returned the canopy to the aircraft
Found the Canopy piston points and reattached them to the canopy
With the Pseal installed it kind of stuck out the front so I reversed it and it looks better.
Pulled the plastic protector off the canopy
Added weather strip to the base of the canopy (turns out not to be enough
Canopy closes well with the latch.
Seat Belts were installed
Also added a new through the firewall ball for the main positive lead.
PLEASE DO NOT OPEN the canopy with out me showing you how it should be done. The frame flexes a bit
i. From the pilot side, you can lift but as you do, pressure should be put to the right to keep the canopy from hitting the roll bar. Same for closing
ii. DO NOT LET IT SLAM DOWN!!! Use your right hand in the middle of the canopy to lower the last bit with your left hand is on the handle.

Installed all wing fairings and tail fairings
Once we receive the Registration, it will be 3-5 days till we can get Stan Faske down to inspect the plane.
We have to do the punch list, Spinner and W&B
Getting Close!!!

  Jun 02, 2022     Seats, seatbelts, floor boards - (10 hours)       Category: Instrument Panel

  Jun 02, 2022     Access Panel, Seals and more - (16 hours)       Category: Fuselage

Work over the past couple weeks. 30 total hours for Don and the Steves

1) After the first successful engine runs, we still had two issues. The right mag did not seem to be firing and the mixture was too rich.
2) After 2 additional test runs, we solved both issues. The right mag was firing 180 deg out of phase and once we figured that out, the mag worked.
3) We did compression checks and timing checks and that helped resolve the issues. Two cylinders were 65/80 and two were 79/80 and this was cold and the ending is not any where near broken in.
4) Found only minor oil drips and after tightening things up, the only drip is a tiny seep from the oil filter.
5) Still had charging issues and running too rich.
6) After conversing with AFS, we determined that Steve R was right and we needed to run a positive cable to Pin 3 of the voltage regulator. Without it, the regulator will not function. Went to 3 auto stores and finally found an inline fuse holder and 2amp fuse. Once that was connected, the alternator and regulator came online perfectly
7) Turns out that when I was adjusting the mixture on the throttle body, I was going the wrong direction. I saw an R on the adjuster and assumed that the L was on the other end but in reality, it was an R with an Arrow telling use which way to turn. Don turned it to full lean and that cleared up the rough running.
8) Oil Temp and Pressure along with fuel pressure EGTs, CHTs were all good although we got up to 310. We were trying to keep the CHT under 300 on the initial test runs.
9) Idle was good and prop cycles properly with no leaks
10) ALL IN ALL, GETTING THE ENGINE RUNNING WAS AWESOME!
11) We continue to tick away at the last things to do and we keep finding more little things and it is amazing that each little thing takes hours.
12) Accomplishments over the past couple weeks.
a. Wing root fairings installed temporarily. Used a marking guage to give the 3/16-1/4” spacing. Used Don's yellow shears and they worked perfectly. Cutting evenly on the long fairings was moderately difficult
b. We then installed the rubber seal and clecoed the root covers in place. It was interesting that there were a couple of holes that will not line up underneath in the area of the under belly wing overlap. In the end, covers are installed and it all looks pretty good.
c. DID I TELL YOU THAT #8 nutplates are REALLY hard to screw into. By the time Don and I were don with the left wing, I was already tired and then did the right side my self and man, are my arms tired.
d. Don dimpled and counter sunk the holes for the under horizontal stabilizer gap covers and then installed them.
e. I am not sure if I mentioned this in a prior post but I put the vertical channel covers on the sides of the fuse over the spar with a crap load of pop rivets.
f. After making sure the nuts on the flap arms were tight all around, I installed the rear interior flap arm covers.
g. Found that we did not dimple the nutplate holes in the forward hatch covers. I machine countersunk them and then test fit the covers. The screw heads are not sitting down the way I would like and they will have to come off and figure out why.MORE #8 screws. Did I mention how hard they are to get in the new nutplates?
h. Started to install front spar cover plates but they do not fit well and may need to be modified because of the stainless steel fuel lines. Need to wrap the area with f4 tape where it goes through cover plate. Might try to split a rubber grommet so we can get it over the fuel line.
13) SENT REGISTRATION REQUEST TO FAA for N66T probably going to take 100 days to get the registration and we cannot request the certificate from the FAA until we have the permanent registration.

Little things taking lots of time. Trying to do stuff a couple times a week.