Sunday and Monday were hot and wet, with high winds aloft, so I decided to make another change to try reducing the cylinder head temperature.
I used the pattern from the last skirt to create the blank . Once I added the rivet holes I trimmed the bottom edge to 3 1/2".
This change about doubled the height of the skirt. It's a little close to the LH exhaust pipe so I hammered a bump to give a little more clearance.
It looks good. We need to go flying.
A couple weeks ago I made some new chocks for when I'm hand propping the motor. I wanted bigger chocks which would be harder to jump if the throttle wasn't closed as the motor started. I don't want to get chopped up by the prop. I made these from a piece of a 6x6. The other chocks were made from a piece of 4x4.
I used the table saw blade to carve away some of the bottom and more of where the tire touches. I like then, they won't be easy to jump over.
Like the small chocks I tied the rope so they always fit the wheels.
I kept getting in the cockpit without removing them so I made the rope long enough to hang the end on the Pitot mast. That way I can see the rope when I go to step on the wing, to get in the cockpit. It works.
Yesterday was hot but nice otherwise, a good day to see if the skirt changed the CHT, and for flying in shirt sleeves. It was still 88 degrees F when I took off at 6 pm. The CHT got up to 435 F at traffic pattern altitude where it had been pushing 460 F on cooler days. Cruising at 76 mph and 2200 rpm the temperature stabilized in the low to mid 390s. It's not the solution but it is better. Oil temperature settled to 205 F.
I flew over and checked out the Corn Maze west of Orange, in front of the strut. There's a sunflower, a pig, and I think a butterfly. I'm not sure what the other small things are, maybe just the maze.
I flew for over 1 hour. It was really nice.
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