Winter Prep - Preemptive Priming

[skelrad]

I’m just getting rolling on my fuselage and super happy to have the kit to work on over the winter. One thing I don’t love doing in the winter is priming large parts though. I’m thinking about priming all of the large skins (and maybe even all of the stiffeners) of the tailcone and rest of the fuselage this month while I still have some warm weather and can spray outside. That would mean priming skins before all of the initial assembly and drilling is even started. I normally match/final drill then prime then dimple. I’m sure priming first means a little more beat up primer because of the build process, and I suppose completely bare holes from drilling. Any compelling reason priming first to take advantage of weather would be a bad idea?

 

[rsr3]

Nothing to stop you touching up the primer here and there if you felt the need?

 

[MJarreau]

Direct from Vans....

Brandon,

We posed this question directly to Vans. Their response was that there was a theoretical discussion to be had about how dimpling might be affected, but realistically, there is no problem priming first.

Our reasons for doing this are slightly different than your's. We inventory our kits, then do as much of the deburring as we can on as many parts as we think makes sense. We then walk through the plans, page-by-page, and do the modifications we find, including separating of parts that come together, and shaping - again, this assumes we feel comfortable there will be no fitment issues with those parts. We then scuff, prime, and put on the shelf. When fabrication starts, we have already completed most of the drudgery work and the assembly feels like it goes faster.

The approach we take was gratuitiously taken from those smarte than us on this site. We like it and thought others might be able to glean something from it.

Cheers,
Mike

 

[skelrad]

Brandon,

We posed this question directly to Vans. Their response was that there was a theoretical discussion to be had about how dimpling might be affected, but realistically, there is no problem priming first.

Our reasons for doing this are slightly different than your's. We inventory our kits, then do as much of the deburring as we can on as many parts as we think makes sense. We then walk through the plans, page-by-page, and do the modifications we find, including separating of parts that come together, and shaping - again, this assumes we feel comfortable there will be no fitment issues with those parts. We then scuff, prime, and put on the shelf. When fabrication starts, we have already completed most of the drudgery work and the assembly feels like it goes faster.

The approach we take was gratuitiously taken from those smarte than us on this site. We like it and thought others might be able to glean something from it.

Cheers,
Mike

I'm kind of being forced into this method a little bit, largely because of some back ordered items in my kit. Instead of bouncing around the build too much because of missing pieces, I'm thinking of going the route you did and just prep as much as possible. I have already started building what I can, but literally got sidelined at step two on the firewall because of missing pieces. That's got me considering what things I can confidently prep ahead of time vs bouncing all over the build and potentially forgetting things.

As much as I like my normal priming method of drill, prime, dimple, I think I will go ahead and scuff and prime at least all of the skins (also wrapping my head around what pieces to change from my "daily driver" primer of Ekoprime, to the Ekopoxy for the cockpit area). I know I will likely cause some damage when assembling and drilling everything, but I think touching up a few areas with a Q-tip is more palatable than spraying a bunch of big skins when it's 30 or 40 degrees out.