Panel mod idea
 

Show me your SUB panel, just a slight take off of the sticky, I'm in the panel planning stage and I would like to put everything, space allowing, on the panel behind the panel, ground forest, fuse blocks, D9 panel, ect, then fabricate a 14X7 swing out picture frame to mount the Dynon 10" com, intercom, AP, and Baro knob panel onto. My main concern is being able to change out a fuse in flight, and not having to go contortionist under the panel....EVER....well, almost not as often as almost never ever..........

Panel
 

Tip-up or slider? Oh, sorry see it's a slider. Had some ideas for the tip up

I am at the same stage and also interested in ideas.

Before I started hinging the panel for inflight access, I'd ask the question - why are you changing a fuse in flight? What is so important that if the fuse blew, you had to chaneg it to land? And how can you ensure that the cause of the short isn't still there, so the second fuse won't blow?

If you have flight-critical fuses, you might consider putting them in a separate panel that is easily reachable.

Sub Panel
 

Here's what I've done on a tip-up RV-7A. The sub-panel was constructed by placing .040" 2024 T3 Alum between two 3/4" plywood forms (with rounded corners) shaped to the desired sub-panel shape. The 1/2" metal edges were then slowly hammered over the plywood edges, allowing compound curves. The top edge was formed "UP" so it could be mounted to the lower edge of the panel. The lower edges were formed in the opposite direction (so they face towards the firewall). A brace (to the next forward bulkhead) was added near the throttle cable mounting area to make the sub-panel more rigid.

In my case, the panel was re-made from the stock panel, allowing more total height, or more length below the sidewall decks, so that the air vents could also be mounted on the sub-panel. LED switch lighting was also added (flat strip above the switches) where the sub-panel mounts to the panel.

Hope this helps....

Paul, note that I don't have any circuit breakers of fuses accessible during flight on my panel. All fuses are ONLY accessible while on the ground. I like my electrical design to be more like my car, but with enough redundancy so that if anything fails, I can still safely get to my destination ....

I think you were asking about the sub panel behind the main panel, but if not, please disregard.

I put everything except the VPX and the ground tabs on the sub panel. The ground tabs are on the inner firewall.

For my tipup I had to make sure I marked the inner edge of the tipup frame on the sub panel. That's what most of the blue tape is for.

I made white paper cutouts of each piece and taped them to the sub panel and then drilled the units in place. You can see some of the white and the tape.
You have to make sure to allow space for the connector plugs and attachment flanges. Some are quite large.

I removed the support ribs and used the radio tray as a replacement sub panel support.

Sub Panel
 

I guess I misread your question when I posted above. Here's what I did for the mounting all the fuse blocks and black boxes in N924RV.

All fuses are located on the front deck ribs. All the avionic boxes are mounted on the shelf over the rudder peddles as well as the batteries. The front deck has been modified with access panels to allow full access to the rear of the radio stack, fuses, and all other electronics. The pictures below are from various stages of construction.









Hope this helps....

Great thread!
 

Hi Guys,

This is a very timely thread for me, too .. I've just finished fitting the forward deck and am beginning to figure out where to put everything.

Keep posting photos!

Agree with Paul about an inflight reset/replace of a blown/popped fuse. In the airline world an inflight reset of a breaker is only checklist directed or at the captains discretion due to safety of flight reasons. On the ground maintenance resets all breakers with a logbook entry for tracking. I had a checkpilot relay a personal experience where they reset a breaker inflight that caused a small fire back in the day that he's never forgot :eek: our policy is leave it out and check it out.

Thanks for the pics guys, My plans are to do something similar to post 6, so ok, no replacing fuses and no wiring repairs on final, I get it, just trying to design a no under the dash to fix stuff plan, just getting started with wiring, fun stuff!