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This is the initial cleaning and inspection of my KR1 boat project
I purchased this KR1
boat project
in January of 2011
I worked for 2 weeks cleaning the 30 year old dust off the KR1 boat.
Upon inspection I've discovered some minor damage to the bottom of the fuselage
in the 3rd bay aft of the seat back support. You can see part of what I'm
talking about in the 2nd picture on the top row of pictures. There is no
damage to the wood (thanks to it being well coated with a sealer) however it is
evident that it was exposed to moisture, the sealer is deteriorating (flaking
off) but only in that bay. The main damage was to the glue, the glue has simply
deteriorated around the perimeter in the bottom of that bay.
Now if you notice in the 2nd row of pictures, 4th picture over, you can
see a dark discoloration on the fuselage floor that begins aft of the main spar
and extends into the next bay under where the old sling type seat was, no damage
to the glue or wood just a dark discoloration on the floor plywood. This project
sat dormant for a long time, i believe it was mothballed around 1980. Some
of its storage time was in a old barn. I'm guessing that the dark
discoloration underneath the seat was where some old barn cat took his naps, and
I'm going to also guess that where the glue has deteriorated is where he may
have taken a leak or two on some of those nights when it was just to cold and he
was just to old to leave the cabin. I just don't think that such a small
amount of exposure to moisture (water) would have deteriorated the glue to the
point where it just crumbled apart, however exposure to the salt in urine may
have over time dried out the glue to the point where it failed and got all
crumbly. Of course this is all just speculation. It is fixable. One
good thing is that I didn't discover any cracks in the longerons. and all of the
rest of the glue joints look good.
Other problems that I discovered
2, The 3/32" 3 ply mahogany plywood webbing on the wing spars
was installed with the grain of the plywood running parallel to the spars.
The plans call for the plywood webbing to be installed perpendicular to the
spars. This will need to be changed.
3, The firewall also has
deviations from the plans. Both the upper and lower wood frame pieces of
the front of the firewall (where the engine mounts bolt to) have been made
wider (as in taller) than the plans call for (I believe this was an attempt to
beef up the firewall). Also, instead of sheating the front of the firewall
with 1/4" plywood as per the plans, it was sheeted with 3/32 3 ply mohagany, the
same stuff as used for skinning the sides and bottom of the fuselage.
The plywood shelf still needs to be installed as well.
This bring me to problem # 4, The aft section of the fuselage was sheeted
with 1/16 mahogany plywood, sides and bottom. The first 2 problems
look like they will be easy to fix however I haven't worked out what to do with
the last 2 problems. Oh, there is minor damage to the right side elevator, no
big deal, easy fix, famous last words. Other than that every thing
else looks very good.
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