Random Items & Canopy Frame Cont'd

I keep chipping away at the canopy. Every step has a problem of course, which is apparently normal.  Let's just say the canopy isn't the shining star of Van's design.  To keep me from throwing things across the garage, I've been knocking off little tasks here and there to keep some momentum going.  I crawled back into the tailcone today and installed the seat belt cables to the anchor point and also ran the static line up to where it'll tee (one tube going to the ADAHRS in the tailcone, the other tube going forward to the instrument panel).  I also stumbled on the fact that the rudder cable is held in place by an adel clamp where it exits out the fuselage to the rudder.  There is a plastic tube running along the last 5" or so of the cable to protect it from the skin at the exit point, and for a long time I've been wondering if I should put some proseal on it to keep it held in place.  Nope, adel clamp.  While I was back there, I saw that I had never put nutplates in place for the elevator control horn access covers.  There is an access hole on each side.  I dimpled all of the holes that I could, but my squeezer wouldn't fit to do the upper screw holes.  I should have dimpled these when everything was a big flat sheet.  I'll have to get creative to figure out how to dimple without the squeezer.

Moving back up to the canopy, I started working on the channel that sets in front of the roll bar and attaches as the back support to the hinged canopy.  It's a thick piece of aluminum that is formed with flanges in a curve, so it requires a lot of fluting to flatten it out.  That's easier said than done because of the thickness.  I got the left side in pretty good shape, but have a ways to go on the right side.  For whatever reason it's been a lot more difficult to get sorted.

I drilled the center splice plate to the left channel.  It won't get drilled to the right channel until things are clamped tight in the right place.

I thought I'd lay out the side rails of the frame to get the general pieces all put together and slowly sneak up on getting everything in the right position before I start drilling and riveting.  I ran into an issue right away though.  The side rails have a piece of aluminum angle welded to the rear.  This angle is supposed to mate up with the channel.  The right side rail is fine, but the left one is welded at a goofy angle.  It doesn't look all that bad, but a 1/8" gap at the base throws the rear face of the angle off so bad that there's no way it can mate up flat to the channel.

On top of that, it's also canted at a major angle.  This is looking top down.  I emailed Van's to ask them about it. Hopefully they'll send a new part.  I don't see how it's usable as-is.

Switching gears again, I looked ahead in the plans to find another task I could knock out.  The front canopy frame skin has three stiffeners that get riveted underneath.  Each of these have 3 big holes that need to have flanges (not sure what they're really called) put into them to stiffen things up.  I'm sure this is one of those tasks that Van's leaves undone to fulfill the 51% rule.  The instructions just say to cut a notch into a piece of wood and work around the hole, bending the skin up 15-25 degrees.  It's not exactly an elegant way to go about it, but works.