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Closing in ramps around Governor

A

AviatorJ

Well Known Member
It seemed like a good idea after paint to take the cowling off and start evaluating and correcting any baffle adjustments/leaks that need attention.

One of my known leaks is the cutout area around the inlet ramp that accommodates the prop governor.



I know from a loose oil plug on the engine case that this is essentially sucking air forward, back through and into the spinner area. A contributing factor could also be the cut out for the AC Compressor belt but that's a different issue that I have a path forward to resolve. I've tried to seal this with baffling material that I have around the governor itself but I've tried different shapes and sizes and it's just not sealing.

For those that have decided to just close it out, what has worked for people? Some ideas I have are;

  1. Use scrap fiberglass and cut to size some close out pieces. My concern is there's no solid way I can think of to secure these since I won't have access to the back.
  2. Use new cloth, scarf the inlet ramps and drape the it over to cover the area. My concern here is having the 'walls' flat. I also can't reinforce the back at all with any flox fillets.
  3. My last idea is to tape out the 'walls' ensuring everything is nice and closed out. Cut a hole and use some fire resistant spray foam and fill up the voids.
  4. Same as above, but after it 'gasses out' cover it with new cloth and have the foam as reinforcement.

Interested in any comments!
 
Option #3 has worked well for me, and only took a few minutes. Make sure you use a low expansion foam. Since the cowling is flammable, I didn't worry too much about overall flammability.
 
Thanks Guy I appreciate it. If it?s working for you then I?m going to give it a go!

On the foam what?s a commonly available low expansion foam?
 
jcarne said:
Brendon, off topic here but where do you find access to the RV-14 plans?
Click to expand...

I was just looking at the plan revisions that VANs posts on their website for the RV-14. It is not the complete plans, but there is quite a bit there. I found section 47 to be interesting as it is much more thorough than the RV-10 plans.
 
bsvantho said:
I was just looking at the plan revisions that VANs posts on their website for the RV-14. It is not the complete plans, but there is quite a bit there. I found section 47 to be interesting as it is much more thorough than the RV-10 plans.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the tip! They prove helpful on my -7A as well.
 
I did basically what Guy did; filled in the areas with foam, cut / sanded / trimmed to shape, and glassed over them.
 
TShort said:
I did basically what Guy did; filled in the areas with foam, cut / sanded / trimmed to shape, and glassed over them.
Click to expand...

That's what I ended up doing. Along with that I made some more space behind #6 with some shims, double checked all lower baffles and RTV'd around any gaps that didn't involve a cylinder.

Happy to say it was a VAST improvement!
 
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