Canopy Trimming Completed

This task was spread out over two days and resulted in finishing the dreadful trimming of the canopy arms fiberglass.

Elizabeth and I put the canopy back on and raised it - which wasn't possible to the full extend due to the low roof in the carport. We got pretty close though, so it was good enough to get good trim lines.

Previously we had the problem with the upper edge bumping into the aluminum top skin when opening the canopy. Now we were struggling with the problem that the lower edges were under tension and snapped inboards a bit when they cleared the canopy decks. This caused a severe problem when lowering the canopy as the lower edge then would catch on the deck and get crushed when the canopy was further lowered. This was frustrating as it appeared I would have to remove a large amount of fiberglass to solve this. Much more than I had seen removed anywhere else before.

I didn't want to create another ugly gap and so I just marked the corner for a smooth removal of some material to see if that would get us in the right direction.

I also thought that adding a nylon washer on the side plates the canopy arms connect to might help to resolve this by keeping the arms a bit spread and away from the canopy decks. I epoxied one nylon washer on the left side and an AN960-416L on the right side which needed less clearance.

This was actually resolving the issue. However, now I had the problem that the arms protruded too far outboards and just looked ugly and also would have scooped in much more air than desired. A closer investigation showed that the solution is in the double bushings Van's is using on the hinges. I hadn't screwed the bolts in hard enough before to actually push the bronze bushing deep enough into the brass bushing in the canopy arm. It needs to be all in and flush on the outside which will then create that spread that I needed to clear the decks.
As a result I removed the washers and fit the canopy again, with perfect success. It opened and closed just fine now.

Time to roll the fuselage out of the carport so I could open the canopy completely and attach the gas struts to see if the full motion was undisturbed.
Everything turned out to be in great shape and working. Now that I could finally close the canopy completely I could also determine the final trim lines for the rest of the fiberglass edges.

And here the close-up of the end result of the trimmed arms:

Still, by far the ugliest part of the whole plane, but finally functional at least!
This concluded the canopy work on the fuselage. Elizabeth and I removed it and I finished the trimming of the rest of the edges and then just forgot to take a photo. I'll see that I remember to add that tomorrow if I don't forget. In any way, you will see the end product when it gets reassembled.

Here are the photos taken a day later.