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   Post on Fabricating a cowl in Kitfox III

   By brilenz, posted 1 Mar 2020

   Well- Ive been working on this cowling now for several weeks and its been a true labor of love.  Thought I would share how and the WHY I did it...
   I started off with the HKS 700E and had to modify the "bumps" to fit the cylinders,...my first go at fiberglass work.  
   Just when I had it looking good- changed engines.  Had some serious issues trying to figure out the crossover on the exhaust on the 700E.  As I was researching, I found a 700T with an exhaust routing that looked promising and how could I pass up fuel injection AND a TURBO!  I knew I wasn't building real "light" so I thought the extra 20hp would be beneficial.
   Now, with the new T mounted, the exhaust was promising BUT now I had an injector hitting the mount and I could no longer mount the huge oil tank in the old "starter" notch from the 582 setup........SO
   Time to rethink the current cowling.  I built 2 new mounting plates moving the engine 2 1/2" forward to allow me to mount the oil tank behind the engine AND the intercooler behind to prevent me from having to hang it out in the breeze THUS nullifying and HP advantage I was gaining.  I wanted to keep as many of the mounting points intact on the upper and lower cowl so I trimmed back as far as necessary for both mounting and aesthetic purposes.  My plan was to "mate" the old section with the new,...attempted fusion!
   So- with the Cirrus out of the hanger for new WAAS GPS's, I set out to make a terrible mess of dust, fiberglass, and epoxy!  Here are the steps I took...
   1. Wrap engine with saran wrap
   2. 1/2" wine corks hot glue gunned to any protrusion that may get close to the cowlings inner limits (don't ask how I got all the wine corks,...Aircraft Spruce?!?).
   3. Spray foam tanks in a kit from Menards, not cheap, but really effective
   4. Using the old wood saw, cut to rough form, minding carefully to any corks beginning to show thru
   5. Sand to shape- and trust me, I am well aware its not perfectly balanced on both sides.  No measurements were used, formed with naked eye only ( and maybe a little of the leftover wine. )
   6. drywall mud in two coats to firm up the creation
   7. sand as smooth as possible WITHOUT going all the way thru to the foam,....which I did,....a couple times....
   8. 3 coats enamel spray paint....and more wine 
   9.  3 coats paste wax, polish to high gloss and a glass of wine between each coat
   10. two glasses of wine and a layer of Vaseline with heat gun quick-melt
   11. 3 layers fiberglass with epoxy resin.  then clean up all the drips of epoxy all over the hanger floor,..naw, never mind, more wine 
   12. split the cowling, matching the original line and the thrust line
   13. Bust 'er back open and begin picking away at all the foam that didn't release ( quite a bit around the nostrils)
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