With the Front Wings fully prepared with IVA trim fitted, Repeaters fitted and a mouse cable installed in the Wingstay, it was now time to bond them in place. A good amount of time was spent getting a feel for the Wings and how they were sitting on the Wingstays. I was conscious of the fact that when the Wings are pressed down onto the adhesive on the Wingstays, there would not be scope for large realignments or repositioning.
To that end, they were positioned with the front edge the required 80mm distance from the Wingstay and a white marker was used to mark the bracket positions. This would at least give me the fore and aft positioning but I couldn't easily see how to get any confidence in an exact left and right positioning. My theory was that this was easier to adjust without causing the adhesive to be smeared into the wrong areas and could be more easily assessed by eye. To provide a good first position to aim for, masking tape was applied to the Wingstays and Wings with a corresponding alignment mark. the Wings were then lifted off and the area to be glues was masked off and keyed with a rough emory paper. The top surface of all four members on the Wingstays were filed down to bare metal and keyed.
Positioning and marking the Wings
The wheels were then refitted and a large fillet of adhesive was applied to the Wingstays. The Wings were lifted over the Wingstays and the alignment marks on the masking tape was used to get a good first position, but without pressing the Wings all the way down. I was then able to inspect the position of the white lines drawn on the underside of the Wings and whilst watching these lines, pressed the Wings down onto the Wingstays. The left and right positioning was then adjusted until it looked even from both front and back viewpoints.
Masking tape was then used to hold the Wings in position by wrapping completely around the wheel. However - I then rechecked the position of the Wings relative to the white marks and found that they had both shifted as a result of attaching the masking tape. Repositioning was easy, but I was surprised to see they had moved.
Filing Wingstays and Wings taped into position
The adhesive was then left to cure overnight.
On the following morning, the masking tape was removed from the Wings and the adhesive was inspected. It had cured to what felt like a fairly solid rubber. Further adhesive was then applied so that each Wingstay arm was covered and was left for a further 24 hours to cure.
Finally, the Repeaters were fitted. I had made a mistake in using silicon cable as a mouse through the Wingstay. This has the advantage of having a slightly slippery surface, but that in turn creates a difficulty in getting masking tape (which I needed to temporarily fix the mouse wire to the repeater wire) to stick to it - so I replaced it with cord.
Mouse taped to Repeater wire and pulled through Wingstay
With the cord taped to the end of the repeater wire (butted end to end so as not increase the apparent thickness of the whole cable) it was gently pulled through the Wingstay until the green Repeater wire emerged. Heatshrink tubing was then slid over the Econoseal connector and fitted over the whole of the repeater wire until it passed into the Wingstay. The Repeater earth wire was then fixed to the Wingstay. I wanted to use a self-tapping screw as a fixing so that it could be replaced easily if required. However, it was extremely difficult to fit so I resorted to a rivet.
Silicon tubing and a grommet were added to the Repeater cable which was then tie-wrapped to the rear upper wishbone. The Econoseal pin was then added to the main lighting connector.
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