Well I had to take a few months off from the SBD to get other things done and save up some money for the rest of this project. Now that I've got the retracts, engine and most of the hardware, I'm back on the case with a vengance! So, moving on to the "business end" of the SBD, I'll cover the steps I took to finish up the fuse and cowl.

First off, I had to make a decision on a powerplant. I felt that the suggested Q40 was not enough power for my taste, and gave the G62 some serious thought. Ultimately, I split the difference and went with a 3.2ci engine from First Place Engines. Great engine, quite light, comes with muffler and CH SynchroSpark ignition... and is a real "looker!" Unfortunately, any engine I liked, including the FPE 3.2, required some substantial cutting to the bottom of my radial cowl. Yes, I bit the bullet and got the Dremel out... ouch! Oh well, it doesn't look to bad from the side, just a big honkin' hole when you look at it from the bottom. I think it will be worth it though, this engine should really treat the SBD fine.

So, with that out of the way, I decided to begin finishing up the fuse from F3 on up to F1. This meant finishing up the sheeting, building the top deck (with gun ports), and doing my cowl mods. The guys at ScaleAero offer a fiberglass topdeck and fiberglass exhaust stacks for the Bates SBD, but I decided I wanted to fabricate them myself. I also wanted to have the cooling louvers in the radial cowl fixed in the open position, so I did that mod myself as well. The next few pages will cover all the steps I took to do these mods.

"Fabricating Exhaust Stacks"