I started fabricating the avionics tray support on Monday, but I didn't like the way the first concept fit together, so I scraped it and went onto Plan B. The first two-thirds of Plan B was fabricated on Tuesday.

Wednesday I was really, really tired, so I knew I shouldn't work on anything critical, expensive, or that I had already invested a lot of time in. But I figured I could safely work on the avionics rack support, if I was careful. Well, I was wrong. I made an error doing some mental math and cut two pieces too short. Of course I didn't note the error until I had already completely trimmed, drilled and polished the pieces. Lesson learned (again) - don't work on the project when I am too tired.

I took the afternoon off today and finished the avionics rack supports. I'll rivet the nutplates on tomorrow after the paint dries and then install it. This photo shows the avionics rack support before the top pieces were finished. The pieces supporting the lower tray were made from some 3/4 x 0.063 angle, with one leg mostly trimmed off. I thought of just using some 0.063 sheet, but I wanted something stiffer laterally to be sure they didn't have a buckling mode failure when I pulled a bunch of g. I probably could have tried to calculate how thick the sheet would have to be to ensure it didn't buckle, but it was easier to trim down a piece of angle. The upper pieces will only be loaded in tension, so they are 0.040 sheet.

Today I also filed a cutout for the CDI course knob so I could move it up one slot to put it right below the EFIS and started the wiring for the cockpit flood lights.

The wiring sure looks a mess in these photos. I have a lot of work to do to finish tidying it up into bundles.