24 Sep 2023

I have decided to install an Aeroled Suntail on the lower fuselage midway between the forward face of the tail tiedown hook and fuselage rib 7. Sling does something similar, just forward of rib 7, but they use Simplepack lights which I'm not convinced are good quality. The Suntail unfortunately has a rather large (13mm) section where the wiring enters the light in the centre of the unit at the rear (the Aveo unit on the rudder, by comparison, is offset to one side and has the wiring harness exiting directly from the unit, around half the diameter). I have a white Aveo too, which would have been a far easier installation, however I want to sync the strobe to the Aeroled tip lights and the Suntail is more compliant with the taillight illumination angles. To keep the light centred across the fuselage I needed to cut a U-shaped section into longeron 801 left. To ensure structural integrity is maintained, I fabricated doublers and a spacer to reinforce that area. The solution is probably over-engineered, but I am happy that it will be a solid structure. A bit of primer should complete the job.

Installed the aluminium rivnuts for the Garmin GMU 11 magnetometer on the fuselage bracket. Drill torque setting 5.