The unexpected shift in the engine's position forced me to flush out the exit holes on the cowling and sand them open on one end even more than before. This now left large holes in the cowling and an ugly finish I couldn't stand to look at any longer. I brought the cowling home and filled the gaps and pin holes with Z-Grip, then "rolled" 3 coats of TP Tools primer. The rolled primer covered well, but had lots of orange peel. Still pretty easy to sand it all down and be flight ready in just 30 minutes time. The really great news is that it looks as if I was able to seal up all the suspected oil leaks on the engine the last time around so after I landed today I found a nice clean oil-free cowling. This marks a milestone now after puting 5 solid hours on the engine plus some. Soon I'll hit 10 and be ready to take passengers again. Today's flight was the best yet. Smooth engine, low temps, and no sloppy oil. In fact, I saw a reduction in oil temps of 5 degrees that I believe is related to the engine breaking in. I also noticed an increase in power. During the first engine run I could only get 2320 Static RPM but today I got a rockin 2400!! You reading this UL Power? ;) I could get used to this....knock on wood.
