New Seat Belts and Radio Hooked UP

 I decided to replace the old belts we installed in 1966.  They were surplus military belts and worked fine.  They appear to be made of cotton which definitely deteriorates over time and exposure to Ultraviolet Light. The seat belt was WWII era and the shoulder harness Korean era.  The new belts fit fine except I had to replace the 1/4" mounting bolts for the seat belt with 5/16" bolts.

 Hooking up the shoulder harness required crawling in the fuselage to bolt the brackets back onto the wood structure.  I had a helper stand by just in case I couldn't actually get back out.  It worked out fine.  You need some boards laying on the structure behind the seat.  If I did it again I'd prop up the tail so my head wouldn't be so down hill.

 I made a mounting bracket, for my hand held radio, from a piece of .070" 2024-T3 aluminum.  It's been Alodined and then bolted to the wing attachment bracket.

 I also made a new wooden hand grip, because I lost the old one.  It's carved to fit my hand and twisted to the left for a comfortable right hand grip.  The red button is a Push-to-Talk for the radio.

 The wiring for the button runs down through the stick, with a clamp at the lower bolt to keep the wires out of the controls.

The wiring is also laced to the structure with some rib stitch cord.

 The wiring comes up to a jack in the corner of the panel so it's easy to install and remove the radio.

 The black cable on the upper left of the radio is to the antenna on the baggage compartment.  It's clamped to the strut fitting so it can't fall down the side of the fuselage when the radio is removed.

On it's way back to the baggage compartment, its also laced to the top of the former beside the cockpit.

 I wanted the baggage compartment to be easily removable so I put a connector in front of the door bulkhead.  When it's connected it just hangs out of sight by the stringers.

 There is a male and a female connector.  The male connector has the locking ring on the outside and the pin in the center.

The female connector has a small socket in the middle for  the pin to enter.  The little socket tube is split in 4 segments so it flexes to fit the pin and grips it securely.

 If you are assembling your own connectors follow the instructions carefully in terms of the length to strip the wire, etc.  The picture at the right shows the ground braiding correctly folded over the metal piece.

For some reason the metal piece got pulled off and I put it back together.  The refolded braid wires are no longer gripping properly to hold everything together and I had to start all over.  I was much more careful the second time.

 The cable inside the baggage compartment is clamped to the frame and taped to the metal shell.  I turned the clamps around so the cable is as much out of the way as possible.

The handheld works fine with it's own antenna but even better with this antenna.