rph142
Well Known Member
And I thought building was hard...
I haven't felt this low since bombing my first calc test in college. After 3 weeks of continuous evening work I have everything primed minus the wing panels and fuse. The primer is fairly easy to shoot relative to the topcoat. The trick is laying down a nice light tack coat before subsequent heavier coats. Too heavy too soon = fisheyes and runs. I thin to 10%+- 1%.
Its the topcoat that is giving me trouble. Lesson #1: Dont get it on your skin! I got some paint on the back of my glove then accidentally scratched an itch on my neck. It felt like a moderate case of poison ivy for 8 days.
Lesson #2
Try all colors on a spare part first! I practiced with my primary base color smoke gray on scrap parts until I had decent results then decided to shoot lemon yellow on my elevators. Of course the finish looked great, but the color was terrible! Sand, prime, try again with new color scheme.
Lesson #3
Dont spray it on too thick! Round 2 on the elevators and I decide to lay the last coat on thick. They looked great, everything flowed out nicely with no runs, it was my best work. The next day I went out and found this:
Its a mild case of solvent pop or blushing. Basically, the solvent couldnt find its way out of the paint before the top skinned over. What youre left with is a cloudy soft matte finish that must be stripped off.
Lesson #4
Dont spray when the dewpoint temp is within 10 degrees of OAT or when humidity is above 65%. The paint simply wont flash between coats causing runs, sags, pigment anomalies, etc. I screwed up my right flaps twice before I figured this out.
Lesson #5
Luck. Today I wasted 200 grams of topcoat because my $60 gram scale decided to jump from 39 grams of catalyst to 70 grams in half a second. I didnt know how much I mixed in so I scrapped the batch. Then, after remixing and shooting 3 nice coats, my gun did something I've never seen before. It started shooting strings and blobs of paint on the canopy skirt. Im thinking the pot life was reduced due to the elevated material temps - ill be sure to store the paint in my AC'd house from now on. More sanding tomorrow.
Anyway, Im still learning, but on the rare occasion when this paint does lay down correctly, it looks quite nice.
I haven't felt this low since bombing my first calc test in college. After 3 weeks of continuous evening work I have everything primed minus the wing panels and fuse. The primer is fairly easy to shoot relative to the topcoat. The trick is laying down a nice light tack coat before subsequent heavier coats. Too heavy too soon = fisheyes and runs. I thin to 10%+- 1%.
Its the topcoat that is giving me trouble. Lesson #1: Dont get it on your skin! I got some paint on the back of my glove then accidentally scratched an itch on my neck. It felt like a moderate case of poison ivy for 8 days.
Lesson #2
Try all colors on a spare part first! I practiced with my primary base color smoke gray on scrap parts until I had decent results then decided to shoot lemon yellow on my elevators. Of course the finish looked great, but the color was terrible! Sand, prime, try again with new color scheme.
Lesson #3
Dont spray it on too thick! Round 2 on the elevators and I decide to lay the last coat on thick. They looked great, everything flowed out nicely with no runs, it was my best work. The next day I went out and found this:
Its a mild case of solvent pop or blushing. Basically, the solvent couldnt find its way out of the paint before the top skinned over. What youre left with is a cloudy soft matte finish that must be stripped off.
Lesson #4
Dont spray when the dewpoint temp is within 10 degrees of OAT or when humidity is above 65%. The paint simply wont flash between coats causing runs, sags, pigment anomalies, etc. I screwed up my right flaps twice before I figured this out.
Lesson #5
Luck. Today I wasted 200 grams of topcoat because my $60 gram scale decided to jump from 39 grams of catalyst to 70 grams in half a second. I didnt know how much I mixed in so I scrapped the batch. Then, after remixing and shooting 3 nice coats, my gun did something I've never seen before. It started shooting strings and blobs of paint on the canopy skirt. Im thinking the pot life was reduced due to the elevated material temps - ill be sure to store the paint in my AC'd house from now on. More sanding tomorrow.
Anyway, Im still learning, but on the rare occasion when this paint does lay down correctly, it looks quite nice.
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