another paint booth

[sglynn]

Originally Posted by Steve Melton

how do you pour paint from a full can and not make a mess? use a homemade plastic funnel and punch 4 holes in the can to let the paint back in. a good tip from Bill Duffy. save the paint, it's expensive.




I gained another ounce by letting it drain completely


flap and aileron

primer, wait one hr then paint, the primer always looks good. I always thin it per the manual with acetone. flows really well and hides scratches. amazing stuff.


paint, 5C outside, DT870, preheat part to 80F, two coats with a little more on the top side, which is the downside in the booth. wait 15 minutes between coats to let the solvent escape. time between coats is the key. to much time and you need a lot of paint, to little time and the solvents don't have time to flash. booth was 75F when beginning the second coat and cooled to 70F by the end of the second coat. I gave the lower side of the flap a half dust coat at the end to see if I could flow it out. it was hanging more vertical than the aileron. it didn't seem to help much and left a satin finish. so my conclusion is that you don't want to do this. put it on wet. hopefully the satin finish will flow out somewhat overnight.

the candles are lit, time to paint!












satin finish, hopefully this will flow out. vertical surfaces are more difficult to flow out. need to time it just right and put it on wet. I will try to get a picture of this tomorrow to see if there is any improvement.


parts "baking" overnight at 65F

I use small dixie cups to scoop paint out of the gallon can and pour it into the DeKups. I use a filter on top of the DeKups. I throw the dixie cups away. They are cheap. No mess on side of can. And you'll notice it is easy to mix the components of the paint 8 : 2 : 1 or whatever. Just use the dixie cup as one. No need to try and view the measuring scale on the side of the DeKup.

[sglynn]

Originally Posted by GLPalinkas

A few positive things?

??.You are at the painting stage in the build process
??.You are STILL painting in OHIO??? in DECEMBER ...WOW
??.It?s looking GREAT.
??.You WILL say ?I painted it myself??with pride

While nowhere nearly as professional as your booth, I managed to get a 30? airplane. You know, Looks good from 30? . Most say closer

Don?t forget to leave your wings in the dining room to thoroughly dry?.

I can?t wait to see your finished airplane.




I even made Van?s calendar this year?. ?Miss March?

Gary, nice job. Please could you post a closeup view of how you grabbed onto the outboard end of the wing on your fixture? I'm preparing now to paint wings and wresting with how to hold them. Spar end will just rest on stand. But I'm exploring ways to grip the outboard end. thanks

[Sam Buchanan]

Steve, here is the fixture I used to support the tip of the wing panel:



Reading your thread is making me tired......painting a plane is a big job.

[Ron B.]

Originally Posted by Sam Buchanan

Steve, here is the fixture I used to support the tip of the wing panel:



Reading your thread is making me tired......painting a plane is a big job.

Tell me about it!!!

[Kyle Boatright]

Originally Posted by sglynn

Gary, nice job. Please could you post a closeup view of how you grabbed onto the outboard end of the wing on your fixture? I'm preparing now to paint wings and wresting with how to hold them. Spar end will just rest on stand. But I'm exploring ways to grip the outboard end. thanks

Steve, you don't have to "grab" it. You can simply insert a long piece of large diameter PVC pipe in the lightening hole just in front of the spar to use as a pivot point when resting on a sawhorse. You do the same with a smaller diameter pipe at the set of lightening holes near the trailing edge. That piece of pipe can be an anti-rotation device if clamped to the sawhorse.

[sglynn]

Kyle
Thanks for advice on using PVC pipe. Good idea. How far in do I have to stick the pipe to make sure I'm not over-stressing the ribs? 3 or 4 Ribs or more like 80% in? Seems like the wing will be resting on ribs and tube instead of on spar. I was thinking of "grabbing" the spar with blocks of wood in order to keep stress on spar, but using PVC pipe looks a lot easier.

thanks

[Kyle Boatright]

Originally Posted by sglynn

Kyle
Thanks for advice on using PVC pipe. Good idea. How far in do I have to stick the pipe to make sure I'm not over-stressing the ribs? 3 or 4 Ribs or more like 80% in? Seems like the wing will be resting on ribs and tube instead of on spar. I was thinking of "grabbing" the spar with blocks of wood in order to keep stress on spar, but using PVC pipe looks a lot easier.

thanks

4 sounds reasonable. The outboard portion of the wing isn't very heavy.

Realistically, it has probably been 16-17 years since I painted my wings (which is amazing, really), so I don't remember how long the PVC pipes were...

[Raymo]

Originally Posted by Steve Melton

my question is, do you really need to alodine before epoxy primer? it would have been nice to skip that step.

Everything I have read says NO. I am not doing alodine. Scuff, clean with acetone, prime.

[A2022]

Originally Posted by Raymo

Everything I have read says NO. I am not doing alodine. Scuff, clean with acetone, prime.

the epoxy primer is tough stuff. my arm is telling me so. the non-sandable primer is closed cell, prevents corrosion. it's seems to be a very slow curing epoxy with pigment. if you wait longer than the seven day window you have to scuff it and apply another coat of primer before paint. I applied alodine and primer within the 4 hr window as posted by ppg. my airplane is in a hangar and not by the ocean. it would have been nice to have skipped the alodine step that way I could eliminate the scuffing step since I am way outside the seven day window. I alodined and primed on the last warm day in Nov and moved the plane inside.

looks like good day to paint, actually it turned out to be a nice day in the mid 40'sF


spaghetti


booth negative pressure, the neighbors say they can't smell any paint. no fogging in the booth. HVLP makes this possible and saves paint too.


scuffing completed and reprimed


paint, as normal for me, horizontal surfaces are better than vertical, vertical has some orange peel

[A2022]

I had one place where I really blew it, the air vent on the passenger side. the last place to paint. I rotated the gun nozzle to a different angle than normal trying to be creative. a mental breakdown. I was tired. the gun laid down a nice concentrated line of paint. ouch! hopefully, on to the blue for the lower side tomorrow if the paint is ready for tape. thanks Mark, my neighbor, for delivering lunch.