Here is a quick update from today, with some photos. It was insanely hot and humid in the hangar today. At least there was a breeze blowing (mainly blowing the dust around so that it would stick to our sweaty skin). Bill, Will, and I worked on Shaky much of the day. Bill spent his time removing windows from the left side of the fuselage. Some were plexi and some were sheet metal. Some were screwed in and some were riveted in. All were spray-painted black. All looked terribly ugly and had to go! Bill spent hours drilling out rivets and rusted screws. Will and I spent our time removing interior trimmings, including the huge ductwork that ran down the center of the fuselage ceiling and supplied heat to the cabin. It was chock full of bird nests. We also removed the cover over the cabin heater, the cockpit headliner, and some of the vinyl covers over the radio rack and part of the left front of the cabin. We filled a plastic trash can with bird nests (as you'll see in one of the photos). But, 42 years of bird nests are finally gone!
Left side of fuselage with most of the windows removed:
Cabin area with overhead ductwork, cabin heater cover, radio rack covers, and right side wall covers removed:
Closeup of right side wall with cover removed, showing original paint and stenciling:
Cabin heater and emergency rescue winch controls:
Radio rack with original ARC-27 UHF radio at the bottom:
Trash can full of bird nests from inside the cabin heat ductwork:
The crew chief hard at work: