I also have to ad that due to the light weight one cannot "bond and split" the bottom as received. Personally I favor the method of keeping them as one piece.
Hmmm. There are -- at least were in my case -- no instructions that came with these when ordered through Cleaveland, so this assertion is new to me and comes sadly after the fact. With Cleaveland, you get a box with the fairings inside. Nothing else.
I did bond and split the bottom because there was nothing to say I couldn't. A couple of weeks ago the bottom of the aft piece ripped apart, I THINK because the aft piece sat higher up -- slightly so -- than the front piece and it might have cause some airstream. You can see in the picture where I'd added a nutplate to the leg fairing to keep that aft piece secure. That was a dump thing to do b/c the fairing needs to "ride" inside the fairing, what with it being clamped up top and all. Now I just use that hole to get the leg fairing lined up properly when I happen to take it and/or the wheel pants off for service, then remove the screw.
Ted Chang gave me the fix, which was to bond in layers of fiberglass along the aft piece that slips beneath the front piece, essentially creating a beveled edge like the aft wheelpants have when mating to the forward half.
I also reinforced the bottom where bonded with some carbon fiber. We'll see how it goes. If I had to do it again -- and who knows, the way things are going, maybe I will --- I would definitely do it as a single piece. I just wish that advisory were somehow contained with what is a pretty large investment of cash for the size of the part.
Using a small nut/screw on the aft edge is a good idea. I tried bonding those pieces together but aft edge of the leg fairing acts like a putty knife and will pry it apart with minimal movement.
BTW, there's no way to get a nutplate in there. There isn't enough room and you'd have to add two. That's a lot of weight ... unnecessary weight, imo.
As for the upper fairings, I really liked the ones I received in terms of how they mate with leg fairing. But I wasn't entirely satisfied with how it fit with bottom of the fuselage and, in particular, the dip to the wing gap fairing, especially with the rubber channel between the two really gumming up the works. Since I'd already bought the cheap Van's fairings, I found those fit well with the fuse/wing gap but not so great with the leg fairing, so I just laid up a few layers and I'm sending the RV Bits pieces to a friend in exchange for beer at Oshkosh. They're very well made, they look a heck of a lot better in construction than the ones from Van's, they just didn't work for me the way I wanted them to.
