Where Did You Come Up With Your Paint Scheme?

[turbo]

These custom built planes we fly interest me first in the panels then the paint jobs. Where did yours come from? There should be some great stories here.

The fellow who built my plane had no idea how to paint it until he saw a King Air on the ramp. They did a great job of duplicating it. A boat builder in Stuart FL did the matterhorn white, the builder did the imron black and gold metalic trim with a clear coat. It has held up great except the tank blisters. I love my RV and expect to keep it forever.

[turbo]

any good stories out there?

[Geico266]

It is truly amazing walking the RV line at a big airshow. Every year the designs get better, bigger, bolder, and more "out there"

I love every one. Each one has it's place and someone put a ton of thought in it.

Who am I to judge?

I just picked one I liked and went with it.

[Jim P]

I grew up with this one in the backyard as it underwent a 14 year restoration, so it had a pretty big impact on me at the time (didn't everybody grow up with an airplane in the back yard?). I really tried to keep the RV scheme as close as I could to the specs at the time including roundels sizing, marking placement, and colors, but had to incorporate the "compass rose" insignia which started appearing when the Yales were transitioned to overall Yellow. There's a lengthy story around this particular airplane starting in 1939, that I've captured here:

http://adap.com/rv7/YalePaint.htm

The Yale was pretty much totaled in 2000 and at the time I had Grady paint the RV, I figured the Yale would never fly again. Well, never say never, it's currently undergoing a restoration so there's a good chance we'll see a really interesting formation flight in the next couple years.

The photo below was taken in 1991 about the time Dad and I flew down to Sun-N-Fun where it won best Trainer/ Liason.

[KirkGrovesRV8]

I painted my 8 in Honor of Lt. Robert " Punchy" Powell a fighter pilot with the 352nd FG and 328th FS, he flew 9hrs on D day. All in all a amazing guy





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[NYFlapjack2]

Before
After

[Bob Axsom]

In my youth I was a competitive model builder (AMA 1967) and aerobatic control line models were very similar in general configuration to RV's. I developed paint schemes for many of them and had a good idea of what works for me. In 1987 I designed the color scheme for our Archer II which was painted by Corona Aero Refinishers at Chino, California and that worked out great in red with silver and black trim. I had no question about designing the paint scheme for our RV-6A. I made MANY copies of the three view drawings in the builder's manual. During the eight years of building I sketched probably one hundred different layouts and reproduced many of the ones I liked. Then I used colored pencils and crayons to come up with the best color combinations just like a kid with a coloring book. Then I made full size paper patterns of the winner and taped them to the airplane. Some parts of the design did not translate well to the full size application so I modified them until they were right. Then I checked pricing with several aircraft painters in Arkansas and selected Gray's Aircraft Refinishers at Ozark, Arkansas. I made up a 30-40 page power point file that described every detail including the dimensions and Imron color numbers and made it part of the contract. I also provided the full size patterns. The result was unique and beautiful from my perspective.

I think it is a big mistake to simply copy another airplane's paint job for several reasons. First, you are denying yourself the oportunity to create something special and second, you take away the copied airplane's uniqueness. This is a job that you can really work on and achieve something special with very little risk - just keep sketching and coloring until it pops out at you as the one you can be proud of.

Bob Axsom

[decathlon737]

Paul I, modeled it in RC previously. Then did my 8 this way.

[n5lp]

Guess I don't have that much poetry in me. From the beginning I thought about how easy the airplane would be to see. I don't remember if I tried to research it that much but I did have a strong feeling, from experience, that black is an easy color to see when looking up and white is a easy color to see when looking down. Ok, that makes it pretty simple, black bottom and white top. Well, I figured it did need to be broken up a bit. What are you going to do? Purple is the obvious color, isn't it? The purple is Jet-Glo "FedEx Purple."

When people asked, and I told them that it was going to be black, white and purple, I saw them shrivel up when I said purple, but I am happy with it and I think it has worn well over time. I do think some of the more flamboyant schemes can get a little old.

I am not happy that the paint shop did not follow my design and I am not happy that the shop did not follow my instructions as to what to paint and what not to paint and I am not happy that I had to drill out some screws to get fairings off, after the paint shop put them on.

The lesson there is that if you want something done the way you want it done, you should probably do it yourself. I didn't have the option of painting my airplane because the TV repair shop where I built it, would not allow it. Oh, that paint shop is no longer around.

[rvmills]

Some nice looking RV's and Rockets out there, that's for sure! Jim P, that's a very cool story!! Honoring your Father like that is great!! Compliments to all the others too. Hey Flapjack...where's the 'winders on the After photo!

My airplane's paint is a borrowed, or hand-me-down story. I bought 'er just after owner #3 (a buddy) had it painted. The original plan was to mimic his F1 Rocket's paint job, but in red with gold & yellow flames, versus his blue with burgandy flames.

The story goes that the painter shot the red, then ran out of $$ and was about to declare bankruptcy, so no money for yellow & gold flames. However, he had three different colors of prism paint from his recent dragster project, so he offered to do some custom flames. Paint supposedly cost a grand a gallon, so the green light was given, and she's now got dragster flames that change color as you walk around it, or as I fly by...all sort of as an ad lib.

Now they're sort of part of the plane's personality, so what the heck!

Here's a shot of Rocketboy's F1, and one of mine, as it turned out:





I can't take credit for any of the look but the race numbers and the tail logo...the rest is all Rocketboy!

I'll bet there are some great stories out there!

Cheers,
Bob