Drilled Top Cowl Hinge

I've been laid up on the couch for the last day and a half with the flu, but I'm starting to feel better, so I'll push myself as usual :-).  I started by clecoing the forward top skin to the fuselage so that I could file the firewall flange back flush with the skin.  This is because the cowl flange butts up against this skin, but it's quite a bit thicker.



I also taped together some pieces of popsicle sticks to hold of the front of the cowl.  This will allow me to adjust the height if necessary.  This is roughly 3/4" thick.



I cut a 44" long piece of the 1/8" hinge material.  I sandwiched a strip of 0.020" aluminum between the hinge and the firewall flange and then drilled the hinge to the flange.  This was slow going since I couldn't use clecos to keep the holes in the skin and the holes in the flange aligned.



I biased the hinge forward slightly so that you wouldn't see the eyelets between the forward top skin and the cowl.