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Baggage door fit

S

scorwin

Active Member
Searched through archives and kit log, but couldn't find an answer to this. And it seems common.

Finished the baggage door, and at the top left corner (near the hinge), there is a significant gap between the door and fuse when closed. All other sides of the door fit great. Gaps are symmetric. I used the seaming pliers at the corner but I'm not happy with how it turns out.

I've already had to fix the door hinge (i used the fatter one accidentally) and get new parts. Trying to avoid drilling everything out and starting over again with the door.

Any hints/tips on how to make it fit better or try it again?

I can attach pix, but those that have run into this, know exactly what I'm talking about
 
I remember not being happy with the door fit and ended up fabricating a new
inner skin to make a perfect custom fit.
Your problem seems to be slightly different from what I can tell. Having a gap near the hinge line would tell me that the hinge needs to be re-positioned.
It has been a while but I remember installing nut plates on the door jamb
so the hinge could be adjusted and positioned perfectly to make the door flush with the fuselage side skin. There cannot be any tweaking on the hinge side, all adjustments need to be made on the rear side where the door closes.
However, the consequence of adjusting any door on one side usually shows up
in the form of another gap elsewhere.
Is your inner skin riveted yet?
 
Mine doesn't sit quite flush at the top either. The pre-punched parts of the baggage door take on a curve across the top when assembled. I think what is going on is that this curve doesn't match the curve we hammer into the longerons. Because it seems to happen to just about everyone, I suspect that the pattern in the plans for the longeron just doesn't quite match what is needed to make the door fit flush. I used seaming pliers to pull the top of the door in just a bit, it is acceptable.

Late one night, past the time I should have been working, I was playing with the door, and it bugged me so I tried to tweak the curve of the door just a bit, with clamps. Of course, I put a small crease in it, and didn't change the curve a bit. Don't do that. Any attempt to change the curvature has to be done before riveting.
 
I've thought of trying to build a fiberglass baggage door. I've had two tries and wasn't happy with either. The current door has a small (a little less than 1/8") gap at the bottom at the hinge but the rest of the door seems to fit fine.
 
Was this a QB kit? I had a baggage door misfit on mine and know of another builder who had the exact same problem.

Upon investigation, it turned out that the longeron in that area of the fuselage was not bent according to the longeron template supplied by Van's. It was bent a little too sharply in front of the baggage area, and to make it fit, the bend in the baggage area was too shallow. That all stacked up to the longeron in that area being up to 3/16" or 1/4" inboard of where it needed to be.

I identified the problem, spoke with Van's about it, and the solution I came up with (and they concurred) was to drill out the 15 or 20 rivets in the longeron area and fabricate a shim to shim the skin out to where it needed to be. They suggested either a poured shim (made of flox and epoxy) or a fabricated metal shim. I made a metal shim that tapered from nothing to 3/16" and back to nothing over a foot or 18", riveted that in place, and moved on. The baggage door fits well now.
 
I have a QB and I am also less than impressed with my work on the baggage door. I've moved on and will deal with it later, it's not horrible but there's about an 1/8 gap between the skin and the top.
 
I noticed my outer skin was not square, I had a better fit if I flipped the skin over. I just got to the clecoing the new drilled frames into the top skin. The part near the lock seems like I need to put a little roll into the little bit of overhang as opposed to a bend with a brake, prior to riveting on the frames.
 
Not a QB kit. From what I've read from this thread and others, I agree its likely from the longeron bend.

The inner skin is riveted on (pop rivets).

I took a couple days off and looked at it again. It's not horrible. I thought about trying another door, since I could just pull the pin out, leave the hinge attached to the fuse and work with that, but i don't want to fall into the "perfection is the enemy of completion" game.

With paint and a seal, it should be ok (and not make it more pronounced!). Prob only one of those things that the builder would ever notice or see.
 
more input

Jack Phillips and I both ran into this same thing on our builds, and talked it over. He built two doors and still had the issue, I settled on my first effort. The door has more curvature across the top edge than the fuselage longeron does across the opening. The middle of the door is proud about 1/8" from the fuselage side. It looks like the easiest fix is to build up the fuse between the cabin top and the door with composite, probably epoxy/flox, and blend it in. That's what we both plan to do, FWIW.
 
Build the door on the fuselage. Start with the hinge and work out from there, lining up the parts to match the fuse as you drill and clecoe them in place. This will custom fit the door to the fuse.
 
Bill Boyd said:
Jack Phillips and I both ran into this same thing on our builds, and talked it over. He built two doors and still had the issue, I settled on my first effort. The door has more curvature across the top edge than the fuselage longeron does across the opening. The middle of the door is proud about 1/8" from the fuselage side. It looks like the easiest fix is to build up the fuse between the cabin top and the door with composite, probably epoxy/flox, and blend it in. That's what we both plan to do, FWIW.
Click to expand...

That was the issue I solved with the shim.
 
wondering

Tom Martin said:
Build the door on the fuselage. Start with the hinge and work out from there, lining up the parts to match the fuse as you drill and clecoe them in place. This will custom fit the door to the fuse.
Click to expand...

if I drill out the blind rivets on the inside panel except along the hinge edge, mash the door to fit the fuselage, redrill the holes and re-rivet the inside panel, will that fix the bow-out? (Might have to add some extra holes to supplement the old holes that will become oblong in this process.)
 
I bet it would. Some chance you may have to pull it off the airframe, put it on the bench and work on it to get it flat enough.
 
Shim

Putting a small shim, just as Kyle mentioned would fix this. I may/may not do it. Like he mentioned, you have to drill out 15 rivets (not a big deal), put a shim in between the skin and longeron (easy), and re-rivet. This would fix it.

Rebuilding the door would recreate the same scenario without doubt.

Thanks to everyone. I would be ordering new parts without the above help, and going in circles.

Shawn
 
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