Keeping Busy Until Exhaust System Arrives

It takes a village to build a plane. At least for me. With my building buddy Craig here, I was all set to hang the motor mount. We literally had the mount on the firewall with all 6 bolts in and I was getting ready to thread nuts on the cockpit side. Craig casually asked, "Hey, did you make that heater duct modification called for in OP-62?" (The EXP-119 Engine install chapter of the KAI) Wait? What duct modification...? So, he's standing there holding the motor mount in place and I look at OP-62 for the umpteenth time... and sure enough, buried deep in it was a small but significant heater duct modification on the firewall side. I'd totally missed it. OK no sweat we'll do it right now and then hang the motor mount. It just involves drilling out 2 pulled rivets and riveting in a small ducting modification. This mod is specific to taildraggers only. So, I go to my big box holding all my firewall forward stuff and start looking for the part.... and looking. Not there. Hmmm..... So, I look at my inventory sheet and notice that part, along with many others, was not accounted for when I did the original inventory when it arrived. The clue light started to go on when I realized it was all part of my long back ordered exhaust system. What to do? The duct mod was possible with the motor mount installed but would have been much more difficult to do. Better to wait. Serendipitously I get call from Van's that afternoon saying my exhaust system was finally ready and being shipped the next day. Yay! To the tune of $2069. Ouch. But I need it. While waiting for the arrival of that box and the one small part it contained, I kept busy with other things. I fabricated the two small steel brackets that the wheel pants attach to. They needed nut plates riveted on and since they were steel, I painted them gloss white to match the other gear components. Then it was on to the Cooling Flap assembly. This is like a pseudo-cowl flap that is cable operated from the cockpit. It fits in the center exhaust tunnel under the fuselage behind the cowling and is unique to the EXP119 engine. It gets a dual pipe Vetterman exhaust instead of the system that's routed into the exhaust tunnel on a standard IO-390 install. I'm not sure why but think it has to do with the unique cowling the EXP119 engine gets that has less drag but is more restrictive. The Cooling Flap can be opened as needed to aid engine cooling and closed when not needed. I got most of it done. Quite a bit of countersinking, priming and back riveting involved. Finally, on to the tailwheel assembly. I'm in a bit of a quandary here. The stock Van's tailwheel works and utilizes dual chains and snubber springs attached to the rudder. Similar to what's on many tailwheel aircraft including the Citabria I owned years ago. It's not particularly attractive but it works and is reliable. There are other options though and many opinions. JD Air makes one that's quite popular using a single link to the rudder. People say it provides way better steering response on the ground then the dual chains. I called a buddy who's owed two taildragger RVs and he's a big fan. What I'm reading is that the JD Air tailwheel gives much better steering response while taxiing but may be twitchier on the runway. I think for now I'm going to use the stock system since I've flown it before and many thousands of RVs use it. I can always retrofit the JD Air system later once I've flown mine some and learn its quirks and idiosyncrasies. The install is easy. I really like JD Air canopy latch that I installed.