THE SHUTTER

Wasn’t this one a hassle. Getting parallel cuts on a curving surface. I marked a center line, measured out from that and the drew a box on the out side of the dome. I then cut it with a hacksaw blade but cut approx. 10mm in from the box. I had the rings made for this, and fitted them after the cut and used my hand held hot wire cutter to straighten up the edges and get the wood to fit. This took a long time and I had to add packing to some areas that I had over cut. I also worried about strength so added wooden triangular reinforcement to the inside of the dome.

All went well, the shutter went in just fine. I added a little packing at the top to level the rails then glued it in and screwed it to the internal triangular reinforcements I had already installed. I made up a lower window out of off cuts. The idea is this lower window will be opened when drift aligning. I then made up a half ring for the shutter door, routed it round, cut it to size and fitted some wheels. I adjusted it to fit on the track and it works a treat.

I then Applied the skin to the custom door. It was raining so I left it in the rain, weighted down, all afternoon. By midnight it had a decent bend in it so I put it under cover and clamped it to shape so it could dry. I also ot the lower window I knocked up from offcuts, applied a goodly amount of filler to hide the bad bits and have decided to use it as the lower window.