The tie down brackets are almost complete, except during the countersinking of the spacers I broke my #40 countersink.  Its the only one I have, so I was forced to set aside the brackets until I get a new one in.

In the mean time, I began work on the rear spar.  I deburred all the edges of the spars, reinforcement plates and the reinforcement fork.  I also match drilled the plates and began cutting the holes out of the center plates using a step bit, a pneumatic nibbler, and a file.

Here you can see the results of the match drilled plate and the first hole almost complete.  The edges still need cleaning up, but its slow going with the files.  There should be a better method (or maybe a better file) for doing this.

I had a quick tool project to take care of when I got to the garage today.  I used a spare piece of aluminum angle and some pop rivets to make a screw driver holder for my cart.  

Next up was working on the tie down brackets.  I had to run to Ace to buy a 1″ saw bit for the tie down spacers.  This took me longer than it should have as I had a million interruptions today.  Either way, the only thing remaining is to drill the nut plates and rivet.

First, a sidenote:  This post from Van’s Airforce is an excellent argument for doing a slider canopy as opposed to the tipover.  Having the roll bar forward must make the aircraft more survivable in the event of a major bird strike.  In this post, see the results of a Turkey Buzzard strike. 

I didn’t get much done in the shop.  I measured the tie-down spacer brackets per the plans and used the scotchbrite wheel to clean it all up.  Unfortunately I don’t believe I have a tool that will let me cut a 1″ hole in the center, so I had to stop there.  I did however trim off 1/16th of the tie down bracket and clean that up as well.