Vinyl Wrap...

[Piper J3]

I bought my 12 from the original builder three years ago with 48TT and now have 440TT. I absolutely love the airplane. Parts of the plane were left bare aluminum - stabilator, fwd portion of vertical fin, and top of turtle deck. Two years ago I vinyl wrapped the stabilator with 3M 1080 Gloss White and it turned out great. Easy to keep clean and very durable.

Now I'm doing same treatment to the vertical fin and turtle deck. I'm tired of polishing aluminum - very dirty process. This time I chose 3M 1080 Gloss White Aluminum vinyl. 5'x10' piece cost $105 on eBay including shipping.

[Crafting N112DR]

How do you get the rivet line to be so uniform? looks like paint its that good.

[Piper J3]

The film is very easy to work with once you learn techniques. I studied YouTube videos before first attempt and had success right out of the box. 3M 1080 is micro-porous and lets trapped air escape ? this lets the film lay down smooth and conform to contours without wrinkles. I have seen videos of vinyl wrap on wheel pants and cowlings using a heat gun to help stretch the material. The technique for the rivets is to prick a small hole at the edge of the rivet flange using a pin. Smooth the vinyl around the rivet with your fingernails allowing air to escape from the pin hole. When the adhesive sets up the film is no longer porous and the pin holes heal over.

I would consider wrapping an entire airplane Vs. paint. I?m not much of an artist, but with the huge variety of colors ? neon, gloss, matt, simulated carbon-fiber, etc., some really cool stuff can be accomplished. You can easily wrap a plane in your workshop, at your own pace, and even do partial components as construction continues. Real boost to the building process if you can see some parts with finished color as your pulling the remaining 5000 rivets?

[Low Pass]

Originally Posted by Piper J3

The film is very easy to work with once you learn techniques. I studied YouTube videos before first attempt and had success right out of the box. 3M 1080 is micro-porous and lets trapped air escape ? this lets the film lay down smooth and conform to contours without wrinkles. I have seen videos of vinyl wrap on wheel pants and cowlings using a heat gun to help stretch the material. The technique for the rivets is to prick a small hole at the edge of the rivet flange using a pin. Smooth the vinyl around the rivet with your fingernails allowing air to escape from the pin hole. When the adhesive sets up the film is no longer porous and the pin holes heal over.

I would consider wrapping an entire airplane Vs. paint. I?m not much of an artist, but with the huge variety of colors ? neon, gloss, matt, simulated carbon-fiber, etc., some really cool stuff can be accomplished. You can easily wrap a plane in your workshop, at your own pace, and even do partial components as construction continues. Real boost to the building process if you can see some parts with finished color as your pulling the remaining 5000 rivets?

How well does it cover underlying colors? I.e., does it have to go over white or single color?

[DaleB]

Originally Posted by Low Pass

How well does it cover underlying colors? I.e., does it have to go over white or single color?

It's pretty opaque. We've used white and black metallic over bright yellow on our -12, there's no trace of the original color showing through.

[Piper J3]

Originally Posted by Low Pass

How well does it cover underlying colors? I.e., does it have to go over white or single color?

I defer to Dale. I have only applied over bare aluminum.

Dale - did you use 3M 1080 Vinyl Wrap? Supposed to be best quality...

[DaleB]

Originally Posted by Piper J3

I defer to Dale. I have only applied over bare aluminum.

Dale - did you use 3M 1080 Vinyl Wrap? Supposed to be best quality...

We've used both the 3M and another brand. There isn't a noticeable difference between them as far as application, durability, and coverage.

[Low Pass]

Originally Posted by DaleB

We've used both the 3M and another brand. There isn't a noticeable difference between them as far as application, durability, and coverage.

Great! Thanks for the quick replies.

[snoop9erdog]

What is your process...or the preferred process for cleaning the aluminum prior to a vinyl application? Did you use the cutting tape for your edges where it butts up to a boundary or paint?

What about anywhere that there are screws...like the fuel tanks. How do you handle those areas?

Different estimates say that the weight savings is in the neighborhood of half the weight of paint. Do you find that to be the case?

Thx

[Piper J3]

Originally Posted by snoop9erdog

What is your process...or the preferred process for cleaning the aluminum prior to a vinyl application? Did you use the cutting tape for your edges where it butts up to a boundary or paint?

What about anywhere that there are screws...like the fuel tanks. How do you handle those areas?

Different estimates say that the weight savings is in the neighborhood of half the weight of paint. Do you find that to be the case?

Thx

If aluminum is new I would just wipe with solvent. My aluminum is oxidized and dirty so I use Scotch-Brite pad and then alcohol wipe.

I use 3M Knifeless tape for butt splices and very carefully use an Exact #11 to trim against existing paint edge.

I haven't done screws yet but I will when I done screwed-on fairing at base of vertical fin leading edge. I guess I'll have to experiment.

I have no data on weight comparison other than what I have read which indicates vinyl is parity or slightly less than paint.

A point worth mentioning is that damage to vinyl can be repaired by placing a patch over affected area with exact color match.