"The ent #2 input is only for the pass headphones only. If you want to add another device, it can always be switched externally going into the #1 input. Currently, there is no easy way to get the ent#2 to the pilot headphones." -- Brad Alexander, PS Engineering - Responding to an email I sent about the PMA6000.

With the wings on, I put terminals on the root ends and attached them to the terminal blocks under the seats. I also fished the low-level fuel sensor wiring up to the panel and hooked it up.

I secured the starter and alternator wiring with some adel clamps using the bolts on the oil sump. Wired the alternator field wire.

I wired up the tail strobe/position light and also the left wingtip lights.

(Time: 4 Hours)

Wired up Van's tach sensor to the EIS4000. Red = 12v, Black = Ground, White = Data.

Bill and I tried to test my mag wiring but couldn't figure it out. Guess I'll know when I try and start the engine. :-)

(Time: 1 Hours)

I wired up the ignition switch and magneto's. Mag's are easy.. one shielded wire each. Ignition switch has a collection of wires going to it.

(Time: 1.5 Hours)

Ran shielded wire to magneto's. Don't have ring terminals, so have to order those.

Ran a 2nd audio input to audio panel for some entertainment audio.

Ran a wire from panel to alternator area for the Alt field.

(Time: 2 Hours)

Finished mounting the strobe power supply in the tail and spent lots of time cleaning up the shop.



(Time: 30 mins)

Wired the transponder lighting circuit back to always on since the GTX320 won't work with the LC-40 dimmer system I have. No biggie, lights will be always on.



(Bouncing between electrical and finishing)

(Time: 30 min)

I wired in the entertainment audio jack and tested out the MP3 player... it works.

I did some other miscellaneous wiring and screwed on the panel for the last time I think. I wired up the low level fuel warning system.

My brake line system has been springing leaks all over. I had a leak at the right brake caliper, so I tightened that up. I noticed that I had some fluid on the floor underneath the brake reservoir, leaking from the fitting that goes into the resevoir. Then last night I saw fluid underneath the parking brake valve. I wiped it clean as I couldn't tell where it was leaking from.

(Time: 4 Hours)

Finally back out in the workshop to do some work. It's been over a month since I've done any real work on the plane. It's been hard to get back into the building groove.

-- Put some labels on some wires that didn't have any. (Had to trace them to figure out what they were!)

-- Worked on installing the strobe power supply. Put the molex connectors on the wires. Made some z-bracket mounts so mount the power supply on the floor just behind the baggage wall.


(Time: 2.5 Hours)

Switching gears a bit and going to fiberglass, so my entries will be over in the Finishing log.

I sanded down the epoxy/micro mixture I used to fill the holes, don't think you'll be able to tell where the were once painted.

I decided to put the canopy back on the fuse so I could determine seat cushions for Sandi. Here is where my evening went downhill... into gluminess. The whole tip-up canopy fit is horrible... between the design and my workmanship ship.. it really sucks. There is a 1/8"+ gap between the canopy decks and the side skins. For some reason the pilot side is pushed aft more than it was the last time, so it isn't closing right... and the gap up front is huge. Along the middle area of the tip-up skin where it meets the fueslage top skin.. it sits to low and is bit concave, which is also why the canopy frame itself is too wide. Seeing this really put me in a funk. I'm seriously considering ordering new tip-up frame pieces and starting over. It would cost me about $400 and a lot of time.

(Time: 1.5 Hours)

Between a stop at the chiropractor, dinner and horrendous traffic, we didn't get home until late, so I spent about an hour removing the round instruments from the panel and then mixing up a batch of epoxy/micro to fill the panel mount screw holes. I offset the ribs and on the passenger side I didn't consume the two screw holes with an instrument yet, so I thought I'd just fill them before I paint.

Since I had a lot of expoxy left over, I grabbed the end caps for the horizontal stabilizer and smeared a bunch of the mixture over the ends. Way back when I used some balsa/fiberglass to close out the ends on these. I'll sand it all down when it dries to get a smooth surface.

(Time: 1 Hour)

I pulled all of the wires out of the connector for the CDI so I could reroute them through a hole in the sub-panel and then reconnected them all.

I installed the two accessory power outlets. I mounted one on the passenger side sub-panel. It won't be accessible in flight. I struggled to find a place to mount the second one but landed on the perfect place! I mounted it on the fuel selector valve cover. It will be down low, hidden but easily accessible.





I also debated on where to mount the OAT. The best place would be out in the wing somewhere sticking out in the breeze. In the end, I decided to put it right next to the flap pushrod exit hole. I figure there will be lots air coming in through that hole. The only downside is that is is likely to pick up exhaust, causing a higher reading.. may have to rethink the location now that I just typed that.

I fussed with the engine monitor a bit. They default Aux 1 to be Manifold Pressure but I had that in Aux 2. Probably would have been easier to just switch the pins but I reprogrammed it instead. Also set the scale for the fuel pressure sensor.

I tested the dongle that FDS sent me for dimming the transonder.. it didn't work.. I got no lights at all out of it. I'll just leave it be and let transponder be full bright all the time.

Caused myself lots of damage today... burned my finger on soldering iron, kicked the nosewheel with my little toe and whacked the inside of my right ankle on the canopy strut bracket climbing out of the fuselage to answer the phone... it was Bill.

My list of electrical things to finish inside the fueslage is down to half a dozen or less.

(Time: 5 Hours)

EAA Chapter meeting first thing in the morning, got to see a Rotec radial engine and Kitfox project. I think I'll drop Lycoming and install a radial in the RV!

I stopped by Ray's on the way home to have him help me wire the led-tipped switch I bought to use as a GPS/NAV switch. That took 45 min.

Next stop on the way home was at the upholstery people's house. I found a local retired couple who does upholstery to cover the foam I ordered. Had a nice chat with them. We've picked out the material, foam should arrive on Monday.

Back in the workshop.. and it's 2:30 already. I fussed with some rubber stoppers and headphone jacks as a quick-disconnect option for the passenger stick. Quit about and hour later... need to rethink this a bit.

Wired up the new nav/gps switch and installed in panel.







(You can see the resistor soldered in place on the switch to drop the voltage down to 2 volts for the LED.)

Mounted the 4th dimmer pot that will control the instrument dimming. I installed it next to the avionics dimmer pot, which required me to relocate it a bit. I created a little 'cover' to hide the hole. (Bill's idea. It came out a bit crooked.. I may have to fix that.. it will bug me.)



I also tested the wig-wag circuit on my landing lights... and it works great!

I mounted the CDI to see how well the connector is going to fit on the back.. it isn't. I'll have to drill a hole in the sub-panel directly behind the CDI and fish the wires through that, which means I'll have to take all the wires out of the db connector first and then put them back in.

(Time: 4 Hours)

I wired the pwr/gnd to the artificial horizon plug and spun it up. (I wired the ground to the wrong pin at first.) The OFF flag shows until the gyro is completely spun up, which takes a little while.

Ray had mentioned to Bill and I to be careful how high we put our radio's in the radio stack. The canopy frame and tip-up brace could interfere/rub on whatever is up top if you aren't careful. I forgot all about this when doing up my radio's, so I had Sandi come out and help me set the canopy on. My audio panel tray is 1.5" from the top of the panel and it is approx. 2" from the rear of the tray to the sub-panel. With the canopy in place, I could just get a finger between the tray and the reinforcement bracket on the canopy. Ray said he put his at 3/4" from top and the canopy frame was hitting the wires coming out of the back of the tray. Since my radio's are flush mounted, my tray extends back farther than normally mounted trays.

TIP: Plan for this! If you put a full length piece of avionics at the top of your stack, you could run into trouble. I would suggest marking a line on the sub-panel where the tip-up channel runs. This will tell you how high you could mount something.

I made a list of about 18 electrically related things to do but just didn't feel motivated to do them, so I went in for the evening having only crossed off one.

(Time: 1 Hour)

I tackled mounting the altimeter. Again, it took a long time to get the cutout for the kolsman knob made. I'd highly suggest buying a template for these cutouts if they exist. I also mounted the compass.

I went ahead and mounted the other instruments in place and attached the static tubing. This was pretty easy. I ordered a variety of fittings to use. It took me a little bit of testing to get the right combination. When I install the Dynon at some future date, I'll have to branch off the pitot/static lines and run over to the other side of the panel but that should be easy enough.





I ran a couple of #20 wires for the electric artifical horizon. I'm out of #20 wire now, so I need to order some more.



(Time: 4.5 Hours)

I started off the day by mounting the engine control cables. I pulled out the bracket that the controls mount to and marked the hole locations. The plans don't have the cables mounted symetrically, so I modifed that. Also, the plans call for four 1/2" holes... the carb heat is a 3/8" hole and the mixture cable is a 3/4" hole. I also mounted the parking brake cable on this bracket. I attached the nutplates to the sub-panel bracket, which was a challenge doing inside the plane. This is probably something you should tackle prior to riveting in the center sub-panel.

I worked on connecting the parking brake cable to the brake valve. This was fairly straight forward. I used a DG3 adel clamp to hold the cable using a small bracket I attached to one of the firewall stiffeners.

I wanted to hook the marker beacon antenna up to the audio panel but the sub-panel was blocking direct access to where I needed to connect it. So I removed the panel and enlarged the hole in the sub-panel, REMOVING THE CANOPY RELEASE MECHANISM HAT SECTION. That hat section gets in the way if you have a full height radio stack. There are so many wires running to the audio panel... and i had them all running through just a narrow slot. Guess I'll just have to bolt the canopy in place like everyone else is going.

With the panel removed I want to get back to finish mounting the instruments in the panel. I made a cut-out for the hobbs meter and punched a hole for the compass. I put them on the far left side above my key switch. It's a little busy over there but that's the best I could come up with.

I mounted the 209A CDI as well. Making the cutout for the OBS knob takes the most time since you want it to look nice... I probably spent an hour alone just mounting the CDI.

(Time: 9 Hours)

I mapped out how I wanted the two custom engine display screens to lay out, so I programmed those in last night. I also noticed that the warning light wasn't coming on, so I checked the wiring and discovered I had it wired incorrectly. So I changed that and it works! FYI, I replaced the stock round EIS light with a nicer square one from ACS. Matt Burch said that round one was hard to see. The square one sure gets your attention and it looks nicer too.

(Time: 1 Hour)

I ran some more sensor wires for the engine monitor, re-mounted the manifold pressure sensor (twice). I terminated all the wires to the DB-25 connector and plugged it in and turned on the unit.. worked just fine the first time! I really can't tell if the sensors are working yet and I need to sit down with the book in front of me to know what numbers are where. I need to run wires to the tach and the OAT and that will complete the wiring of the EIS besides hooking up the CHT/EGT wires when the engine is hung.

Tip: When mounting items to ribs the run between the firewall and sub-panel, make sure you don't block access to buck the rivets. I installed the mp sensor almost at the top and then realized I'd never be able to set half a dozen rivets, so I moved it down to provide better access.

(Time: 2 Hours)

I wired the Garmin 320 transponder to a seperate dimming circuit and confirmed that the 'pulsing' still exists. (http://www.n523rv.com/P8160074.MOV)

Next I moved on to wiring up the 4th dimmer channel for the instrument lights. I wired up the fuel gauges, CDI and left a wire for the compass to attach to. Upon testing, one of my fuel gauge lights isn't working. I didn't troubleshoot it yet.

Next I ran some wires for the oil and fuel pressure sensors.



(Time: 2 Hours)

I cleaned up the wires for the switched in/out power since I had just used a wire nut to connect them yesterday. Then I worked on wiring up the PTT in the stick grip. I connected the grip to the terminal switch under the seat and armed Sandi with the portable and did a mic check. It works! Whew... that's a relief.

Next I started working on the dimmer circuits. I bought the LC-40 dimmer from Van's. I fussed around with a location to install it and decided on the firewall side of the sub-panel. I pulled out the instructions and tried to figure out the wiring. The instructions are in color but the wires going to the dimmer switch weren't colored correctly (two blacks) so I couldn't tell exactly how to wire them up. The instructions clearly say if you have trouble to call... so hey.. it's Sunday at 12:00pm.. maybe I can reach someone. I called and no answer so I went about just stringing wires to the dimmer and about 20 minutes later, sandi radioed me that someone was on the phone. It was Flight Data Systems.... they saw the call on their caller-id and called me back! Talk about service! He said I wasn't the only one to call about the wiring on the switches and gave me what I needed.

I wired up the two led 'map lights' I installed on the sides of the cabin. They work great! (At least the come on and dim.. i need to go out there at night and see how bright they are.) I installed the dimmer switches on the inboard facing surface of the F-721A forward canopy deck. Ray did this on his -9 and I liked it.



I wired up the the 89B, audio panel and transponder to the dimmer and installed the dimmer switch on my center console at the top. The Garmin has a problem with the dimming circuit... it pulses when set anywhere between full on or off. I'm not sure what the problem is or what the solution might be. The 89B and audio panel dim just fine!

The fourth dimming circuit will be the instrument lights.. which right now only include the compass and fuel gauge lights. I also need to wire in my music input jack.

Not sure if I should be embarrassed by this wiring mess or not... it sure is hard keeping things neat. As long as it works, I guess I'll be happy.



(Time: 7 Hours)

I wired up the ground wires to the audio panel this morning and turned it on. Damned if it didn't work! Sandi came out and we put the headsets on to check it out. Seems to work just fine!

The last avionic equipment to tackle was the KX-155 nav/com. I needed to get the antenna's wired to it before I could power it up, so I did that. I have a nav splitter that splits the signal to NAV and GS, so I had two short pigtails coming off the back of the tray to the splitter. I'd suggest putting this pigtails on before you mount the tray as I had a hard time making the connections with the tray in the plane and wires all over the place.

I slid the radio in place, double-checked that the power and ground wires were hooked up and to the right pins, slid the radio in place, flipped the master switch and turned the power on the radio..... nuttin! UGHH! Double-checked connections.. yep all were right. Looked at wiring diagram for something I missed. The only thing I could see were two switched power in pins and two switched power out pins. The diagram shows all of these being tied together with a lead running out to the CDI for power if you need it. I didn't tie these together because I really didn't understand why they would be all tied together. So I ran two power wires from the bus into the two switched power in connections. As soon as I turned on the master swtich, the radio lit up! Well... that's odd since the power switch on the radio is OFF. I posted a message to the aeroelectric list hoping someone might have an answer. Then I went back out and decided to just wire it like the wiring diagram says by tying all four wires together. Well what do you know.. it worked! It looks like those power out pins feed the power in pins which feed the display.. and also the CDI when you have it hooked up. Seems like an awfully weird way of wiring things, but hey it works.

I was all excited to test out the transmit on the radio and gave sandi the portable radio and ran out to the shop, put the headset on, turned on the radio and........ uhhh.... oopss.. haven't wired a PTT button! Oh well.. false alarm.

So... audio panel is working... radio at least comes on... tomorrow I'll wire the PTT switches so I can test the transmit on the radio. If the weather is clear I may roll the fuse out in the yard and see if I can pick up any planes flying around. I'm too far from any airport to pick up anything so may have to listen to approach control.

(Time: 4 Hours)

I didn't have any real goals when I went out to the shop tonight and kinda spun my wheels for awhile but started to tackle the headset/microphone wiring that goes into the back of the audio panel. By 10:00 I had pretty much finished it. Couple of notes here....

1) Make sure you label everything.. especially after you cut the label off on wires that had extra length. I was about to hook up what I thought was the copilot mic wires and realized that wasn't what I had in my hand.

2) Leave extra length to allow panel to be pulled out! It just dawned on me this morning on the way to work that I didn't leave ANY extra length in the wiring to allow the panel to be pulled away some. This could prove to be a big mistake but one I'm not going to correct as it would require pulling lots of new wire.

3) Pay attention to what wires go to what pins on the tray. MOST of the time when a pair of wires connect to a tray the pins are close to each other. Every now and then they slip in connections that are on opposite ends of the connector, such as my pilot headphones! I had to cut the end off and extend one of the wires.

I finished up the evening by crawling into the baggage compartment and replacing the stereo headset jacks with mono versions. (Everything is mono so it just made sense to stick mono jacks in...) Of course, working in the baggage compartment with a hot soldering iron was fun! I only flinged hot solder on my legs 3 times...

(Time: 3 Hours)

Hooked up the power/ground wires for the transponder and terminated the ends on the antenna. Hooked the wires up and slid the unit in tray and turned it on. Discovered I needed the 14v lighting circuit wired in to get any indication it was on, so I temporarily stuck it on a fuse.. appears to work! The transponder also feeds the encoder it's power, so I confirmed the encoder was feeding the GPS altitude data and it appears it is.



I obviously need to get the dimmer circuit installed.... and the audio panel will be next followed by the nav/com. Weds. is movie night so no more work until Thursday.

(Time: 1.5 Hours; 82.5 Total to date)

With help of builder-buddy-bill, we got the 89B working. First we confirmed I didn't fry it by powering it on with an external power supply wired for the 89b. It came right on. Damn.. why isn't it working in the plane! I opened up the connectors on the external power supply to see how it was wired to compare it with how I had wired it. The ONLY difference was I didn't have power running to the 14v Lighting pin and the Voltage monitoring pin. I think it was probably the 14v lighting pin that needed a connection to run the display. The 89b will monitor bus voltage and warn you if it drops below a preset level, so I'll have yet another LV warning system. So I made up a quick wire and hooked up those to pins.

With it powered on in the plane! and hooked up to the antenna, I rolled the fuse out into the open to make sure it picked up a GPS signal. I compared the lat/long position it displayed with the Garmin 196 and all appears well. Now I just have to figure out how to operate the darn thing.

(Time: 1 Hours)

Spent all Saturday afternoon/evening wiring. I pretty much finished all the wiring of the 155/89b/209A with each other and ran the audio wires up to the audio panel.

Sunday... I was pretty ineffectual today.. low energy.. did a lot of wheel spinning. I did make the cutout in the sub-panel for the radio racks to fit through. I put the panel in place.. immediatly had an issue with the BNC connector on the back of the transponder. Since I flush mounted it, it extends back to where the bnc connector is almost touching the sub-panel.. and it just so happens the is nearly falls in line with the rib that runs from the sub-panel to the firewall.. an 1" more outboard and it would have been OK. I think I just barely have enough room to get a cable connected with some minor modification to the sub-panel.

I wanted to try and turn on something... so I made up a antenna cable for the 89B and hooked up the GPS antenna. I put the fast-on tabs to all the power and ground connections for everything. I tried to get the GPS turned on but it wouldn't come on. I double-checked all the connections (missed a ground wire) but still couldn't get it to power up. I don't know what the hec is going on.

I was certainly enjoying the wiring but now I'm kinda burned out on it and frustrated that the GPS didn't come on.

(Time: 12 Hours)

Didn't get started working until late and ended up staying up until 11:30 working on the wiring.....

I've started wiring the KX-155 and KLN-89B to the KI-209A CDI. I managed to get the 11 unshielded wires made up and connected. I wasn't paying attention and made up 11 wires with a female DB pin on one end and the king connector on the other end and then realized the 89b tray has a db connector, not a king style connector on it, so I had to make up some new ones with db pins on each end. I hope I can reuse the wires with the king connectors on them.. those things are pricey!

I bought a $130 crimper for the king connectors but can't figure out how it works yet.. I crimped a couple but the connector doesn't fit into the crimper far enough. So I used my cheap $30 crimper from SteinAir that works great! (Don't bother buying a King crimper... not needed).

Here is what our dining room table looked like this morning.



(Time: 2.5 Hours)

I attached the radio racks back to the panel and spent some time pulling out the old wires in the KX-155 connectors. I have the drawings out and ready, my wire order from SteinAir will arrive Thursday and I can start the wiring process.

(Time: 1 Hour)

Looks like I'm headed to Oshkosh. I've wanted to go but didn't want to spend the $$ to get there. Our chapter program director is riding his Goldwing up on Thursday, so I'm going to ride with him. I'm shipping a box up with a sleeping bag and some clothes. I'll find a place to camp out. Still working on a way back, since Chuck is continuing on to Canada.

My 209A CDI arrived also! It is perfect.. brand new. I'm very happy with it. (Sometimes eBay pays off... most places sell them for $1295, I paid $955.)

So some real work.... I finished mounting the Garmin transponder tray. I flush mounted it as well. You'll see in the picture it's positioned a bit odd on the panel. The plan is to install a small map box underneath it and eventually a Dynon D-10A will go up above it. I haven't fabricated the map box yet, so I didn't want to cut any holes yet. Included pictures of the other radio's mounted as well.







(Time: 2 Hours)

Nearly the entire day was spent cutting holes in the panel for the radio's and moutning the racks for them. LOTS of filing. I decided to flush mount the radio's, so they look good.

To get the face of the radios flush, I used a piece of 1.5 x 1.5 x .125 angle. I cut one side down to 3/4" which was riveted to the panel. The 1.5" face of the other side allowed the tray's to sit farther back. I positioned the trays, marked the holes with a sharpie, drilled and tapped the holes for the tray. The audio panel was a bit more of a pain since it was substantially narrower than the King trays.

I also cut the hole for the EIS 4000 engine monitor and the hole for the transponder. I need to get the tray mounted for the transponder, and mount the CDI when it comes tomorrow, then I can bring the whole panel in the house and commence wiring.

(Time: 8 Hours)

I made up the first avionics wiring harness tonight... wiring the blind encoder to the transponder and gps. The kln-89b needs altitude as well. This harness was pretty easy.

(Time: 2 Hours)

I continue to fight the panel layout. I decided to do some 'practice' cutting and fitting of the avionics using my old panel. First I cut out a hole for the EIS engine monitor. Then I took the panel in the house to see how the radios would look. Yesterday I decided to move the transponder over to the right side since I couldn't get everything to fit in the center. So I stacked the transponder, garmin panel mount box and a cut-out of the dynon and dag nabbit, there isn't enough room! It might fit but it would push the dynon clear to the top and the transponder clear to the bottom, so it wouldn't look very good. After trying a few other re-arrangments, I concluded that the panel mount garmin just isn't going to work. I confirmed with Sandi (since that is her side of the panel) what she wanted to do and she agreed that we can take the garmin out of the panel and just mount it diagonally somehow in the corner area of the panel. (Matt Burch did this on his RV-9A and it looked good.) So, in the center radio stack I'll have audio panel, KLN-89B, KX 155 and EIS engine monitor. On the right side in front of Sandi will have the Dynon and the transponder below it. This will also leave room for a small compartment for maps and such. It would be 6.25" wide and only a couple inches tall but that should be plenty. Some day it could turn into another radio slot or something if needed.

I removed all the instruments from the real panel and took it out of the plane, I should starting cutting holes for real this weekend. Debating whether to try and flush mount all the radios or leave them stick out like traditional panels do.

(Time: 2.5 Hours)

I pulled out all my avionics and made a mess on the dining room table. I assembled the racks for the transponder and audio panel. I stacked all the radio's up and took a snapshot.



What's not on this stack is the engine monitor. Later I measured the height of my stack and the height on my panel and discovered that it's too high! AGGGHH! Stupid ePanel builder website isn't accurate, in my case, not even close. So my tip is to not use epanel builder website for anything more than generalization. Remember, the top 3/4" of the panel is unusable because the support angle and tip-up frame and the bottom 1/2" is unusable because this is where the curve of the panel is that makes the flange on the bottom edge. I think I measure 8.5" of usable height.

So I'll be moving the transponder over underneath the Garmin 196/396 on Sandi's side. That will give me some extra room in the center. Glad I measured before cutting anything.

(Time: 1.5 Hours)

Really went to shop just to figure out some parts I need to order from ACS and Van's but Sandi hopped on the mower for awhile, so I soldered on some wire leads to the eyeball light and then blind riveted the pilot side spar cap in place.

I also crimped some terminals on the fuel sender wires and attached them to the fuel gauges. Realized I didn't run a power wire for the gauges, so I'll have to do that next time I'm out.

Tip-up Builders Note: The two angles that hold the canopy latch handles on the side of the fuse interfere with pulling one of the rivets for the spar cap. No reason to not rivet on the spar cap before the canopy latch handles unless you plan on trying to run wires behind it. I'll probably just 'glue' a rivet head in the hole to make it look right.

PS: I really wasn't wanting to buy one yet... but a 209A CDI came up on eBay with a buy-it-now at a good price, so I jumped on it.





(Time: 2 Hours)

This week has been rough... at work.. so I haven't gotten any work done on the project this week. And with Sandi being out of town, my schedule is all screwed up. What's worse, is I had to cancel my trip to San Diego where Dan Checkoway scheduled a lunch fly-out for me. A real bummer!

I did just place an order with Van Bortel for a Garmin GTX-320 transponder and a PS Engineering PMA-6000MC audio panel. Those two items complete the components for my radio stack, so I can start working on that area of the panel.

Really wasn't too motivated to work on the plane today. Took Sandi to airport, trimmed some tree's in the yard, picked up walnuts in the yard. Finally made it to the shop and found some motivation.

I replaced the 28v bulbs in the position lights with 14v versions and tested their current draw. 1.8amps each.

Hooked an MR16 bulb up to see what it's current draw was. I think it came out at 5.68 or something. There was quite a bit of inrush current though.. 6.7 or so. I wrote it down, just don't remember what it was.

I really wasn't planning on the e-bus setup that AeroElecrtic advocates since I have a somewhat basic panel and thought I'd just turn off things I don't need in event of alternator failure. The one 'scenario' I couldn't work around however was a failed battery contactor. Since the e-bus will feed off the battery directly, this takes care of that problem. So I mounted the additional fuse block and wired it up to a switch and the diode.

I also went ahead and mounted the fuel selector valve and hand-tightended the fittings.

(Time: 2.5 Hours)

Got an email from a builder asking how I was picking wire sizes. I have a pretty good understanding of electrical things but don't know much about this stuff other than what I've read (AeroElectric) and what I've been taught (Ray Doerr). I've also been relying a lot on what others are doing.

Here is the formula you need: 700 / (Amps * Wire Loss)

Some explanation. That formula will give you a maximum length of a wire, round-trip (from fuse block to device, back to ground block) assuming a 5% loss. AeroElectric advocates a 5% or less energy loss on a wire. 14 volts * 5% = .7 volts (hence the 700 in the above formula). I'm told that 5% is CONSERVATIVE. Next, the AMPS in the above formula should be the fuse rating, not necessarily the device current. If the wire shorts out, that is how much current it will draw until the fuse pops. The Wire Loss in the formula comes from the table in AeroElectric. (12 ga = 1.59 milliohms per foot, 14 ga = 2.53, 16 ga = 4.01, 18ga = 6.39, 20 = 10.2 and 22 ga = 16.1)

So let's run through an example, the landing light. A 100 watt landing light will draw about 7 amps. (100w/14v=7.1a) Since most builders use 14 ga wire for the landing light, let's start with that as a test. 700 / (7.1 * 2.53) = 38.9 ft max. But wait.. 7.1 amps is the running current of the lamp... two problems. First, when you first switch on that lamp, it will draw more than 7.1 amps for a brief period. Second, 7.1 amps is the device current, not the fuse size. We could use a 7.5 amp fuse but it might pop from the inrush current, so we'll go to 10amps. The formula now reads 700 / (10 * 2.53) = 27.6 feet max (10 feet less than before.) On an RV, 27 ft round trip for a landing light is probably real close and since 5% loss is conservative, 14 gauge wire makes sense for the landing light.

So using that formula, you can calculate what wire size you need. Another important item is to measure the ACTUAL current a device draws.

DISCLAIMER: I am in no way qualified to educate anyone on things electrical. The above is merely what I've learned and quite possibly, could be wrong. I'm sure after review, those more knowledgable will point out any flaws, in which case I will make corrections. Do your own research and come to your own conclusions. I do hope that the above helps though, it took me 2 weeks to get my head wrapped around it.

Wish I could come up with more creative titles for my entries but when working with wire, there just isn't anything you can say. :-)

Matt Burch came for a visit this morning, so I spent some time earlier cleaning up the shop. Things sure get dirty in a hurry. We yacked for a couple of hours and he headed on home.

I started working on the panel again. I drilled holes for the keyed mag switch and the 5-amp breaker for the alternator field wire. I spent way to much time getting a perfect fit for the VSI that needs a cut-out in the lower left. On my first panel, the cut-out was horrible.. too big and wrong shape. I also mounted the AH and ASI. Starting to look like a real airplane when you see instruments in the panel!




I ran 6 #22 wires back to the tail cone for the altitude hold servo. I won't have it initially but having the wires already back there will make it easy to install later. I need to order some #20 wire to run back there was well. I pulled a string through my conduit to use later as a pull-string.

While I was sitting inside, I went ahead and cinched up a bunch of the zip ties and cleaned up the wires, tying them where needed. I need to run some wires to the right side of the fuse for the wing level servo and I think the wiring in the fuse area will be done! I still have all the avioncis wiring to do.

I pulled out the fuel selector plate and put a couple of nutplates on it and mounted the selector valve. As soon as I run the last few wires in the middle fuselage area, I'll mount that permanently. I'll have some wiring to do on the center console for the fuel gauges and low-level fuel monitor.



Bonus picture. Sandi and I were sitting in the shop talking and Winnie (the cat..) climbed up and made himself at home. He's been a bit attention starved since becoming an outside cat and can be quite pathetic as Sandi puts it. :-) He'd stay like this for hours if I let him.

(Time: 6 Hours)

Ran a few more wires, punched holes in the instrument panel, installed the oil and fuel pressure sensors on the firewall.



(Time: 2.5 Hours)

Did some more wiring.. don't exactly remember what.. I had a dull headache all day and didn't feel up to par.. must have been the 10hr work session yesterday.

Also drew out new panel layout on my replacement panel.

(Time: 5? Hours)

Borrowed an RJ-11 crimper from Ray. I shortened the 50ft phone line that comes with the ELT to the necessary length and crimped on a new jack. (30 seconds)

Also borrowed Ray's 135 degree drill angle attachment and put two new wiring run holes in the center section. After mapping out all the wires that have to go places, I realized there was no way I had enough room. The manual trim cable takes up one complete hole in the center. I put a hole on each side, just under the sticks.

Ran the fat strobe wire back to the tail along with two wires for the position light. I don't have the strobe power supply yet, but it will go just behind the baggage wall.

Ran a new wire for the flap motor, first one was too short. Wasn't thinking that both wires had to go to the flap switch.

I also ordered yet another batch of stuff from SteinAir. I think this is the 3rd or 4th time I've had to order something. Purchased the PC680 battery of eBay earlier this week too.

(Time: 2 hours)

Ran my first batch of wires! Ran wires back to the flap motor. Ran wires for the strobe power supply. Ran a wire to power the position lights.



(Time: 2 Hours)

I mounted the battery and main fuse blocks. I'll get pictures to show location later. Battery block is on back side of subpanel on passenger side. Main fuse block is mounted on the inboard side of the passenger side subpanel support rib. This gets it out of the way for the most part but still leaves me access if I need it later on. I just couldn't bring myself to mount it in a place that would be very difficult to access later. This location also gives me lots of options for mounting adel clamps for supporting wires.





Also drilled a hole on each side of the fuse, just forward of the wing spar opening to run the low-level fuel warning wire.

I replaced some of the SB625-7's with SB625-8's which have a slightly larger ID.

I set the fuel/brake line center cover in place to see how wires get routed out from underneath it up to the panel. Looks like there is room on each side to come out and up. You could also put some holes in the little cover that sits over the top of the fuel pump.

(Time: 45 mins)

I installed the 24-tab grounding block on the firewall. First real eletrical thing I've done.

I have identified most the wiring and where it needs to go and have acquired most of the electrical components I need.

(Time: 15 mins)