Installing the rear baffle.^3h

Today was the most critical part of the fuel tank construction -- the baffle.

According to Van's video, the baffle is sealed by placing the beads past the rivet holes and then dropping the baffle in its place. From what I understand, the idea is that sealant is smeared by pushing the baffle in its place, and creates a fillet between the skin and the baffle itself. Again, from what I understand, the idea is not to get a lot of sealant between the baffle and the skin but rather to make a fillet. The instructions tell you to squeeze sealant from between the skin and the baffle to avoid pillowing.

A bead of the sealant.

It took me one and a half 2.5oz cartridges to get the baffle. For the next fuel tank, I will buy one 6oz cartridge (it has 3.5oz sealant inside).

After putting the baffle, this is what it looked like from the inside.

Finally, the tank positioned baffles down (to make use of gravity a little bit).

When I am mixing the sealant, I sometimes "pump" air inside of it. While placing beads, I had a couple of air "pops" coming from the beads. To help remove these pockets and to make the sealant flow better, I heated it with my heat gun once tank was in baffle down position. I don't know if it helped at all or not, but I heard at least one air pocket bursting, so maybe it did help a little.