Now we are on for the biggest layup yet – glassing the sides. The plans state that this job should take 3-4 hours. I’ve read several logs stating that someone used up to 11 hours on this job. This was however working alone, the plans recommends having a helper here since placing the cloth is difficult to do alone. My wife stepped forward as a volunteer and she did a great job. She is now officially a Cozy-builder as well! At the end of the job we had used 4 hours and 15 minutes. Not bad!
I prepared this stage the day before by measuring and cutting the glass, and rounding the sides of the longerons that later are to be covered with UNI. I also filled the epoxy-dispenser up with both hardener and resin to avoid having to do this in the middle of the job.
Both sides are glassed at the same time. It was a bit tricky to get the cloth to lay perfectly in all the curves and not to mention the depression for the fuel gauge. A lot of squeeging and stippeling with the brush. I drew two lines at 30° of each other to help guiding us when we placed the cloth. We worked simultaneously on both sides making the job go twice as fast!
Here we are finished. We scissor-trimmed the cloth. The spacers now wrapped in saran-wrap are placed between the sides again beeing ready for the next step that is to flox the longerons in place. This is to be done while the layup is still wet.
The longerons are clamped against the spacers and weighed down against the sides. As usual I peel-ply everything. If I was to do this again I would have used Wayne Hicks method of using dry-wall-screws from the underside fastening the longerons. My weights was not enough to weighten down the longerons enough making some pockets of air. I discovered this when I removed the weights and the peel-ply. I mixed up some more wet flox and put it in a plastic-bag cutting off a small part of the corner. Then I squeezed flox into the pockets the same way I would decorate a cake. When I’m finished and have loosened the sides from the jigs I will then pour pure epoxy into the pockets from the top to ensure I have bonding all the way.
Glassing the upper longerons with 4 plies of UNI lengthwise. This involves cutting strips of UNI that gives many loose threads when handling. I read a tip on the net that I followed with great success. It’s as easy as to put some tape on the edges and cut through the tape. Then it’s easy to position the ply and just use the scissors to trim of the edge with the tape. No loose threads!