Painting Begins!

Safety First! I began painting with a regular half mask organic respirator. It didn't cut it in the small confines of the garage. I upgraded to a full face fresh air supplied respirator. A high power turbine blows air through the black hose into the mask. This keeps positive pressure in the mask at all times. It's a little awkward at first, but I've been very pleased with it.

This is the right rear horizontal stabilizer after a coat of the UV protector, which is essentially aluminum pigmented paint. At this stage, three coats of clear sealer have been applied to seal the weave of the fabric. The UV protector goes over that. Next, the color coats are applied.

This is the rudder after the first coat of white. The PolyTone paint is the easiest to spray I've ever used. It's a vinyl based paint. It flows out well. But...gloss is highly affected by humidity and temperature. I experimented with retardants to slow the drying and get a better shine, but I didn't get very impressive results. Ultimately, I decided to let it dry flat and then buff it out as the mfg. recommends.

This was a fun moment. I absolutely love the color yellow (one airplanes anyway). My joy was later stomped to death when the yellow dried and revealed shadows in the coverage. Yellow covers poorly over the silver UV coat, so you have to paint any part that is to be yellow with white first. I made the mistake of applying a skimpy white coat. I compounded the mistake by adding another coat of yellow thinking repeated coats would hide the shadows. It was four coats later before the coverage was even. I made sure to lay down a full coverage coat of white on later pieces. Poly Tone users take heed...Yellow coverage sucks bad.

The rudder is masked for a coat of yellow on the tip.

Here's the painfully tedious part. I decided on a checkerboard design, and I found out why you don't see that around too much. When working on fabric, you have to paint half of the checkers, let them dry, and then paint the other half. If you tried to do it at once you would have to cut the masking tape on the fabric with a razor blade. Taking a chance on cutting through the tape and into the fabric just isn't acceptable. So, you have to endure two painfully time consuming masking sessions. I must say the result was worth the effort.

50% of the checkers painted. Now it must dry...dry...dry...for three days.

After one more brutal mask and spray session the results are great!! All of the tail surfaces are ready to fly now.

Here's the start of the wing painting. Unfortunately, I've run out of good painting weather at this point. I have to bring in fresh air to clear the garage, and it has to be warm air for the paint to work properly. I'll resume painting in late April or early May 2005.