Landing Light Parts Prepared For Primer

It came as quite a shock last night to hear the weather report calling for near 60 degree temperatures today and tomorrow. Because of winter low temperatures, I was planning to prime the landing light’s aluminum parts with rattle can chromated primer as needed. However, decided since tomorrow is also forecasted to be around 60 degrees, it would be best not to complete the wiring and to begin preparing all the aluminum parts for the landing light assemblies for Akzo primer. The mounting ribs can easily be seen through the light’s lens so it would look much nicer if the same primer can be seen for all the wing’s components.

The two ribs that mount each landing light come as one piece, so the band saw was used to separate the left and right ribs for both lights. That was followed by filing all the ribs smooth then drilling out the holes for the wire run grommets. Here again the size of the hole was upped to 7/16 on the drill press using a step drill so the larger SB-437-5 grommets could be used.

                                   Using the band saw to separate the landing light’s left and right ribs.
 

                            Top is how the ribs are shipped from Van’s … bottom is left and right separated pieces.

Blue tape was placed on the step drill so the proper hole size could easily be seen as each grommet hole on the landing light ribs were enlarged to 7/16” for the larger SB-437-5 grommets.

                                    Using a step drill in the drill press to enlarge the hole for the wiring grommet.

Next the rib doubler plates were deburred and the mounting slot checked to make sure no binding occurred when an AN-3 bolt was inserted in the slot. The doubler plates also required machine countersinking for all the rivet holes that will mount them onto the landing light ribs.

                                               Using the drill press and countersink cage to machine countersink
                                               the landing light rib’s doubler plates for AN426AD3 flush rivets.

There are two lens backing strips per each lens. All four required some filing to smooth rough edges. Extra care was taken to make sure these were very smooth where they will be touching the plastic lens. The backing strips also require dimpling at the rivet holes that will secure the nutplates that will ultimately hold each landing light’s lens in place.

              All of the landing light’s mounting hardware for both lights fully prepared and ready for primer tomorrow.