Brake Lines & Canopy Frame

A builder who had a lot of extra plastic brake line tubing was kind enough to send me a roll of it so I could swap out the one run that I had made too short.  It didn't take much additional length to make a difference.  Now everything swings freely with no binding.  I'm still not going to attach the lines to the brake fluid reservoir or torque anything down until I get seats in and decide of where I want the whole assembly to sit.  I'll probably bite the bullet and order seats here pretty soon, even though I really won't need them for a few years.  All of the remaining costs for the plane are huge chunks (interior, engine, avionics, etc), so maybe getting a little out of the way now will take a tiny bit of the sting out of the next few years.  Staring at those big purchases, I just keep reminding myself that the plane will one day sell for at least what I have in it, if not a little more.  That's assuming gas isn't outlawed, making it a big paper weight.

I didn't get a picture, but I also got the ELT bracket drilled to the J channels behind the baggage bulkhead.  It is now sitting in the huge pile of parts to be primed in a few months.

Since I'm still waiting on a piece of bar stock to finish the empennage fitting, I moved on to the canopy frame.  The first piece to conquer is way more complicated than I would have thought.  The rollbar above the seats is made up of four U channels that get riveted together to create a rigid box.  I drilled the 1 1/2" access holes in the aft pieces to start.

The canopy frame is attached to each side of the fuselage with aluminum angle.  I didn't get far with making these, but got started at least. They're pretty fiddly to lay out, given that they have goofy angles that help set the frame in the right position.