Regular maintenance

One of the slight (hidden) problems of an elongated build profile – mine was around 4 years build due to pressures of work and the like plus a similarly elongated test flying period – min was around 9 months – again mostly due to work and family commitments means that you feel you are always working on the aircraft doing something .. a little tweak here a fix / update there BUT …

… you sort of think you MUST be doing everything that is good and needed … but, as I took the rudder off for its decals I noted that the  bolts (that I visually check EVERY pre flight for security and split pins etc) were very dry

When I put her together they were greased with some special stuff that I gather the US military use … looked great .. didn’t run .. was fine and easy to apply but it looks like the sea air has pretty much completely dried it out .. having only washed the aircraft fully down a few times and it used any harsh solvents I can only put it down to salty air

So – it’s going to be a session when I get back from a short break away slipping every rudder, elevator, aileron bolt out in turn .. cleaning the shaft and then putting longer lasting more resilient film of grease on – maybe coppperslip like I use on the motorbikes

Will create a laminated checklist for weekly, monthly, quarterly routine checks to add a re greasing section in