Hey Guys,
I thought I would post pictures of the different types of covering and painting that I have done over the last 55 years starting with my Champ in 1966 with Cotton and Butyrate. Let me be clear that I'm not a professional and all my painting has been in my hangar or garage probably as most of you have to do Also my equipment has been from really bad to fair.
I'm not in favor of buffing. Why you might ask. Well I'm to lazy and I find it easier to paint than buff and all the problems it can cause. On my Starduster I sprayed ONE heavy clear coat after the top coats of color were applied. This gave me a surface to sand with 600 wet/dry and I would squeegee the surface to make sure it was flat and smooth. Then I would spray on two thinned coats of clear. No buffing required
To get Poly Tone to shine. Before spraying the 3rd coat of color sand with 600 wet/dry The final coat is mixed with equal parts CLEAR, high temp reducer, retarder, and color. You have to have color pigment to protect the clear or it could yellow. This is the same ratio as we used with Butyrate and cotton a long time ago. You can up the clear and retarder ratios some. I spoke with Greg at Consolidated Paint (poly Tone People) about what I wanted to do and he had never heard of it. He did sell me some Ploy Tone clear which is what all poly starts as. I sent him pictures of the finished product and he was quite impressed and recommended it to some others.
These are the wings to a EX-2 Carbon Cub with Poly Tone and clear that Son, Grandson and I assembled it in 2018-19. It took 10 months
Notice I didn't say build. I built my Starduster Too we assembled this KIT.
It is painted in my garage and the same place the SD was painted. Notice the red floor. It's been that way for over 20 years.
You can not get the Poly to shine like the polyurethane Superflite process. This is the best easiest
process that I have ever done.
This is the EX-3 that Son and I are now assembling.
This is Poly without clear added. Nice just not all that shinny in 2018
The fuselage had butyrate on it so I reapplied color dope with clear added after rejuvenating.
This was a project that had to have the front spar replaced due to a horizontal crack we replaced the rear spar as well. This is probably the cleanest fabric 1976 plane I have seen and it is original dope in great shape. We used dope on the right wing in 2021 to match the rest of the plane.
We had to splice in the outboard part of the spar, replace the tip and some ribs.
Since this had been finished in Superflite we used it on the right wing in 2021. This was the first time I used Supeflite and was really impressed with it. The Superflite was applied over poly spray.
My SD has PPG Durathane on top of poly spray in 1997-8 with no cracking of any kind. The alum. parts have PPG Concept. Neither of these paints need a clear applied but I did for the reason stated above.
This has Aerothane in 1992 which I will NEVER use again. It is to thin, dries to slow can't buff off overspray and other problems
I stripped the Bonanza and it was painted with DuPont acrylic enamel in 1994
Painted in a hangar but not this hangar with acrylic enamel in 2015
I painted all of these in the last 29 years with the Champ being the oldest and after 29 years still great.
Here is another example of not buffing. Son's first car. We made a street car out of it before he went into the Navy in 1990. After storing it in my Hangar for 25 years I restored it for Grandson.
It is painted with PPG Concept Red and black the silver is PPG two stage and clear on everything
Well Guys, Happy Painting.
I thought I would post pictures of the different types of covering and painting that I have done over the last 55 years starting with my Champ in 1966 with Cotton and Butyrate. Let me be clear that I'm not a professional and all my painting has been in my hangar or garage probably as most of you have to do Also my equipment has been from really bad to fair.
I'm not in favor of buffing. Why you might ask. Well I'm to lazy and I find it easier to paint than buff and all the problems it can cause. On my Starduster I sprayed ONE heavy clear coat after the top coats of color were applied. This gave me a surface to sand with 600 wet/dry and I would squeegee the surface to make sure it was flat and smooth. Then I would spray on two thinned coats of clear. No buffing required
To get Poly Tone to shine. Before spraying the 3rd coat of color sand with 600 wet/dry The final coat is mixed with equal parts CLEAR, high temp reducer, retarder, and color. You have to have color pigment to protect the clear or it could yellow. This is the same ratio as we used with Butyrate and cotton a long time ago. You can up the clear and retarder ratios some. I spoke with Greg at Consolidated Paint (poly Tone People) about what I wanted to do and he had never heard of it. He did sell me some Ploy Tone clear which is what all poly starts as. I sent him pictures of the finished product and he was quite impressed and recommended it to some others.
These are the wings to a EX-2 Carbon Cub with Poly Tone and clear that Son, Grandson and I assembled it in 2018-19. It took 10 months
Notice I didn't say build. I built my Starduster Too we assembled this KIT.
It is painted in my garage and the same place the SD was painted. Notice the red floor. It's been that way for over 20 years.
You can not get the Poly to shine like the polyurethane Superflite process. This is the best easiest
process that I have ever done.
This is the EX-3 that Son and I are now assembling.
This is Poly without clear added. Nice just not all that shinny in 2018
The fuselage had butyrate on it so I reapplied color dope with clear added after rejuvenating.
This was a project that had to have the front spar replaced due to a horizontal crack we replaced the rear spar as well. This is probably the cleanest fabric 1976 plane I have seen and it is original dope in great shape. We used dope on the right wing in 2021 to match the rest of the plane.
We had to splice in the outboard part of the spar, replace the tip and some ribs.
Since this had been finished in Superflite we used it on the right wing in 2021. This was the first time I used Supeflite and was really impressed with it. The Superflite was applied over poly spray.
My SD has PPG Durathane on top of poly spray in 1997-8 with no cracking of any kind. The alum. parts have PPG Concept. Neither of these paints need a clear applied but I did for the reason stated above.
This has Aerothane in 1992 which I will NEVER use again. It is to thin, dries to slow can't buff off overspray and other problems
I stripped the Bonanza and it was painted with DuPont acrylic enamel in 1994
Painted in a hangar but not this hangar with acrylic enamel in 2015
I painted all of these in the last 29 years with the Champ being the oldest and after 29 years still great.
Here is another example of not buffing. Son's first car. We made a street car out of it before he went into the Navy in 1990. After storing it in my Hangar for 25 years I restored it for Grandson.
It is painted with PPG Concept Red and black the silver is PPG two stage and clear on everything
Well Guys, Happy Painting.
