Fabricating vent lines^4h

Got my tools for flaring and bending the aluminum tubes, so I decided to do the vent lines.

The material Vans provides in the kit is the 3003-O Versatube, which is a very soft aluminum tubing. I opted to use 5052-O instead, which is a stronger alloy. Also, it comes in straight lengths vs coils Vans provides their material in.

The process turned out to be much easier than I thought. The hardest part was the section that starts at the side of the fuselage (the fitting that is connected to the fuel tank on a wing). The main complexity there is that it needs to go around the longeron, and then go around the rudder cables, all in a very short section of the tubing.

However, after some experiments, I figured out the best way to bend it, in two bends done with the tool plus one bend done by hand. The bend I did by hand was the one closest to the fitting, as it is a very tight bend. To do it, I temporarily screwed a straight fitting and used it as a lever to bend the tube.

For all the sections I did bends using the Van's supplied material first, then replicated the same bends on the 5052-O tubes. The most artistic section was when the tube went from a horizontal section to a vertical one along the firewall. I kind of just eyeballed it using the soft tubing.

Did not take many pictures, but here is the result.

The right side vent line.

The right side vent line outside of the fuselage.

The left side vent line.

And some of the experimental bends.

Also, I got an aftermarker fuel vents.