Firewall Sealed Off

Part of section 29 is to seal off the perimeter of the firewall to the surrounding skins to keep away any fumes or dangerous carbon monoxide from the cockpit. This is what I did today, reluctantly. Still working on getting over the flu and the associated coughing and congestion is annoying enough. Wearing a respirator and trying to get into confined spaces while wearing it and trying not to gunk-up the pretty paint job with firewall sealant didn't really sound appealing to me.
It wasn't appealing but I did it anyway to get it over with.
First I turned the fuselage on its side. thanks to the rollbar this is a one-man job still, despite the really heavy structure.


Then I masked all the areas around where the sealant was supposed to go.


Then I cleaned the application area with alcohol to ensure good contact of the sealant. By the way, I learned that the firewall sealant is much thicker than the Pro-Seal stuff used to fuel proof the tank (and which was used in other areas to seal off the firewall). So it requires much more force to push that stuff out of the cartridge which can get a bit tiring. Particularly as you have to finish off the cartridge in one run once you mixed the components. It's all or nothing.


I added some drop catching paper layers before knowing that the stuff is so think I wouldn't have to worry about it dropping.
It also dried very quickly and became to hard to nicely spread it out with a popsicle stick, so I will just get the look as it applied right out of the cartridge. Not exactly what I had hoped for.
I am now waiting for the stuff to fully dry and will then take the masking tape off. An attempt to do it right after the application showed that it comes off from the electric tape easily but then still sticks to the main string, so I decided to wait until it's cured before removing the rest of the tape.