Todays Top Tip: Sealing Cowl Heat Barrier

[goatflieg]

I'm sure others have tried this, but I wanted to share my positive experience.
Yesterday I spent seven hours cutting and applying the aluminized heat barrier recommended for the interior of the bottom cowl, which I bought from Aircraft Spruce. It is recommended that the seams and edges be sealed with high temp RTV, but before I did I conducted some tests using aluminum tape. The results were promising, so I went ahead and sealed all the seams and edges with the aluminum tape. I used a plastic roller (bought for fiberglass layups, but never used for that purpose) to firmly press the barrier material onto the epoxy layer applied to the raw interior the day before. When I used the roller to also apply the aluminum tape, it worked perfectly to bond the tape and blend it into the panels. I'm hoping the glue on the aluminum tape will hold up to the heat exposure; it is designed for HVAC applications so it should. In any case, the results are far better than expected. It's been awhile since I had a genuine "Yee Hah" moment in the shop... but this was one of them.
(Darn it... Google Photos is acting up again... my shared folder isn't sharing any more. Working on the problem)

[goatflieg]

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/pw...-no?authuser=0
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/pw...-no?authuser=0
OK, so it seems my shared folder settings are all correct, but when I use the "share photo" icon above, it instead shares a link to the photo. The links work for me, but I need to know if they work for anyone else. Also wondering why they don't pop up as the image like they used to. Doug, if you have any suggestions, please advise.

[FLY6]

I can see your photos fine. The results of your work look very professional. Good job.

[Bob Martin]

awesome work.......

[hgerhardt]

[gmcjetpilot]

I think it looks great and should last a long time, heat, fluids will take a toll over time but I see this lasting a long time. We shall see. Nice work.

[Ironflight]

Beautiful job! One word of warning for folks doing this in the future however - there is a huge difference in quality in aluminum tapes. I did this to myRV-8 when it was new, and the tape eventually started peeling off, and I had to do it over. It’s enough work, doing a whole cowl, to make it worthwhile to check the specs on the tape you’’re going to use so to make sure its good for a couple hundred degrees.

Paul

[tfoster100]

That looks great. Thanks for the tip.

[Aluminum]

Any reason not to do the entire surface in HVAC tape only?

In fact, why not high-build prime and sand flat, then tape only?

It seems to me a shiny flat aluminum surface would retain less heat than the serrated one that reflects onto itself.

[riseric]

Very nice job and good looking !!!


What part # from Spruce did you use and can you say what quantity was necessary? They offer different aluminised heat barriers...


Thanks