Propeller and spinner - The prop spinner comes as a simple fibreglas dome, which can be used on a variety of fixed-pitch and constant-speed props. The builder must make cutouts in the spinner so it can fit over the blades. The blades on a constant speed prop twist through quite a range of angles, so the cutout in the must be big enough to ensure there is clearance between the blades and spinner.

I strapped some pieces of wood to the back side of the prop blades so I could twist them through their range of motion as I fitted the spinner. I wasn't as careful as I should have been, and the blades contacted the spinner in two places as I twisted them. I have to remove some of the paint and then see whether I scratched the aluminum. If so, I'll polish out the scratches to be sure there aren't any stress concentrations, using Hartzell's guidelines.

I've still got to finish installing the little metal plates that fill the area behind the prop blades, install the nutplates that the spinner screws go into etc, but I'll do all that stuff once its too cold to do fibreglas work.