Getting legs

I finally got to the point where I was far enough to get the plane up onto the table in order to get the gear under it. I have been putting this off because of the order in which I needed things done. The first thing that I wanted to do was get the engine. With the engine I was able to check to see if the engine mount interfered with the engine sump. I wanted to do this while the mount was not on the plane so I could weld with everything on the table.


The mount was touching the sump screen, so I decided to lower it just like the BPE setup. In fact, I just ordered the bent pipe from Rhonda at BPE



 Everything fit-up right before TIG welding everything in place. With the engine mount modification complete I was able to paint everything and re-install the mount. The mount is a good lifting point to attach the engine hoist to. In total, I had 3 points to lift the plane and this was solid enough that I ended up doing this by myself (not recommended). On the back of the plane I put the tail on a step stool. In the middle of the plane at just aft of the baggage door I put a 4-inch strap connected to the garage rafters via heavy duty ratchet straps. On the front of the plane I used the engine hoist connected to some 48-inch (double arm length) runners. On top of that I put one more strap mid-fuselage for a fail-safe.