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Daniel S.

Well Known Member
Morning all-
It's a ways off for me BUT in thinking a long ways ahead as usual, I'm wondering if it's better to have the plane paint done before or after final assembly. Maybe, a "painter" could chime in. It seems to me that you count get better detail / coverage prior to final assembly. Kind of an open question but I'd like to get some pros / cons. One con I see right off is damage during final assembly and random damage that usually happens during the first year (fuel leaks, numerous cowl removals / installs etc.) As usual Thanks all!
 
Are you painting it, or is a shop, I am doing mine in the garage, one piece at a time as I build. I find it better to flip the wing over rather than crawl under it and spray up, the pros can do it no problem but not me.
 
Painting before assembly is easier and can result in a better job.

Biggest disadvantage of doing it this way is that you are much more likely to scratch the new, soft paint during assembly.
Paint takes several months to cure completely.
 
Daniel, look at Brets log and pictures. You will see a great example of painting before final assembly. One factor to consider is that your "parts" look one heck of a lot better when they are painted and that helps with motivation. I have my airframe complete and fitted and my plan is to paint all the parts before assembly. It is easier to control overspray and it is easier to paint parts than the whole airframe.

Another thought is to paint the airframe with your background color and then do the rest after assembly. Do that if you are not totally sure of your design and need to see it on the plane first.

As for scratches, that is a concern. My plan is to pick a color that is used on cars so I can go to autozone or another supply house and get touch up paint. You can even get it in spray cans. Scratched can easily be touched up, wet sanded, and they disappear.
 
Just a note on scratches, the clear coat on my paint is WAY more durable than the aluminum. but yes, that is after it fully cured, I had to prop the wings so no paint was in contact with anything for about 4 months.
 
Daniel,

As you are starting to hear, there is no right answer to your question. I was able to get my RV-10 painted for about half the price that I would have been charged by some of the more popular paint shops like Glo Custom. Additionally, I also did have to fly half way across the country and by a round trip plane ticket, which makes the savings even greater.

I did find a painter whose day job is a painter at the local GMC dealership. There is some risk using an auto painter, because they tend to want to paint a little heavy. I lucked out in that this painter has a 2500' grass strip, a Stinson, a Hyperbype, and a Fokker. He was well versed in how to keep an aircraft light.

Transportation to the paint shop caused me to get a little creative. A RV-10 won't fit on a standard trailer. Most tow truck companies freaked out when I asked for rates to move the fuselage. I quickly learned to simply state I have a vehicle with a 8' wheel base that is x' long and y' tall. I also had to beg and borrow trailers from friends and friends of friends to get the other parts transported.

There were parts of the process that were a royal pain in the rear. I have four colors, white base coat, silver metallic, red metallic, and gray metallic. It was a four to five day process for each assembly since each color had to be painted and masked separately, then clear coated.

To help keep costs down, my wife, daughter, and I assisted with the prep work and masking. Laying out the paint masks for the compound curves was a pain and sometimes lead to very emotional conversations on what needed to be done or corrected. My wife got frustrated because she had problems seeing the big picture and why things were done in a certain order. However, now that the RV-10 is all painted (except for the wheel pants), she now has a very high sense of pride and ownership. When she sees the final products, she knows it was a lot of her hard work is what made it look nice.

I've also got to fess up, as many of you know, I had surgery on my achilles' tendon about half way through the paint job. My wife and daughter had to pick up my slack. They are still helping me with the final assembly since they now too see the light at the end of the tunnel and what to fly as much as I do. I'm glad that the last few months turned into a family project.

Like everything else in the project, it all comes down to your goals and objectives. How much do you want to do, how much is your budget, what are your time constraints, and are you building a show plane or something to go get a $100 hamburger?

At the moment, I am very satisfied with the route I went. I don't have a show plane, so I wasn't overly concerned about getting a perfect paint job (which I don't think exists). With all that said, I think my paint job looks great from 1-2'.

Photos are on my build site if anyone wants to take a look.

Good luck with your paint, with whatever decision you make!

bob
 
What perfect timing for this thread!

I'm just starting my build, having picked up a partially completed kit. I'll have the empennage completed, fiberglass and all, before moving on to the wings -- and when the weather is more conducive to spraying paint. I have been thinking I'd much rather paint the pieces as they are finished than leave it all laying around bare with bits of blue vinyl stuck to it, but didn't know if that was a crazy idea or not.

The idea of painting the base color as the individual parts are finished and do any of the fancy stuff after assembly is a good one. I'm hoping to come up with a paint scheme that avoids putting any "swoopy" or angled design elements across control surfaces or fuse/tail/wing/gear intersections, so it can easily be laid out, masked and painted without being assembled. So far I haven't even begun to work on a paint scheme, but I think it's time to at least pick a base color.

And just a thought for you guys who might be planning to paint your own plane. Our local community college offers a "Special topics in auto body restoration" class. It's basically a "bring your own project" class, with access to a well equipped auto body shop with a couple of nice paint booths. I took it once before to complete the restoration of a '55 Vespa scooter. I'm thinking I may do it again to be able to use the professional quality paint booths and equipment to paint the RV.
 
Bob-
Actually, your experience is partially what got me thinking about this. Thank you for the feed back.

I painted a car once... I'm not even contemplating painting this thing! AKZO Primer I'll do all day long but "finsh" paint definately not my cup of tea. I'd like to find a good painter here in the local Atlanta area. I kind of like the painting as I go appraoch BUT matching up the aged/cured paint vs. fresh paint over the years might be difficult (I imagine). Maybe, if I find a local painter I can get him to do my interior (When I get to that part). :D
 
Dale-
I'm the exact same way. I complete one section to 100% including glass, electrical lights. etc. before moving on to the next section. But I've been planning my built for about 7 years. So I have pretty much every last detail planned out.
 
I'm in the do it myself camp. The only thing I would have done different is I wish I had painted the bottom while still in the canoe stage and used spray cans on the interior. I'm just getting into it and haven't shot much color yet. The epoxy priming is fairly easy.

I guess once I get it flying and the comments start coming in will tell me how I did.

Bob your painted plane looks nice.
 
Daniel S. said:
Dale-
I'm the exact same way. I complete one section to 100% including glass, electrical lights. etc. before moving on to the next section. But I've been planning my built for about 7 years. So I have pretty much every last detail planned out.
Click to expand...

Great! The one single regret I have is that I saved all the fiberglass work until the end. My wife and I spent a great deal of this past year working on the fiberglass. I wish I broke it into smaller chunks per the plans. It would have been more tolerable.

bob
 
Before and After

I'll add that I believe that painting is a skill just like building an airplane that can be learned and that the curve is fairly steep. I elected to put mine together and paint later. I am now regretting that decision. I had always wanted to paint it myself and last spring talked myself into finishing first and hiring it done.

I have several friends in the body shop business that were willing to help get me started but I used the usual excuses to finish first. Scratches, fuel leaks, control problems, all those things. As it turned out, the only problem I've had is with CHT's just a little higher than I'd like and it would have had no impact on a completed paint job. I did finish all the FG at home or the hanger before I flew.

I've been in contact with quite a few different paint shops in the past 2 or 3 weeks and am slowly getting over the sticker shock. While I know it's a lot of work to paint a completed airplane, not so much on one in parts. I suspect that any good auto body painter would do it for no more than 1/2 of what a good Airplane shop will charge. It seems the going rate these days for a 3 color paint job ranges from $8-10,000. BC/CC or single stage, I've had multiple quotes on both. They just get a lot of money to paint one of these planes. Lord only knows what they would get to strip and paint a 172!!!!

Anyway, if I had it to do over again, I would have painted it myself or at worst hired a local body man to paint it. It would save a minimum of half that.

The other thing about painting it before flying is you're going to be having so much fun flying that you won't want to be without it 4 or 5 weeks!!!!
 
I hear you Paul.. good thing you & I didn't build -10s :eek:. $10-17k+ on those bad boys. It's worth it to me to pay the 10-12K for a professional paint job. I absolutely HATE painting anything with a passion, even with rattle cans. The last thing I painted was my wing stand posts (metal)... Yep, I still hate painting :eek:
 
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