Panel powder coat

For you guys who powder coated your panels, did you do just the front of the panel or both sides? If you did just the front side (as I would like to), did you have to mask off the complete back side or were they able to lay it flat when shooting the power coat.

Thanks, Bill

Send a memo to skunkworks (Mark Bishoff). He has one of the best 12's out there and the panel finish is fantastic. He can bring you up to speed on this.

both sides

I had mine done on my rv7 and they did both sides, looks and works great.

Had mine done by a local powder-coater ...

.. and for all practical purposes, it's painted both sides. The electrostatic process ends up attracting paint on the backside, whether you want it or not. Although it was expensive, once I found out they could do a semi-gloss finish in exactly the color I wanted, I was sold. After a year of flying, it was worth every penny.

I had one side powder coated

We have a local guy that does this out of his home.
I asked him not to do the backside or the edges.
Keeping the edges clean allowed the pieces to fit together properly.
He plugged all the holes and just sprayed the one side.
Came out great, see pic below.

One side. Rivets don't like the added thickness.

Thanks everyone for the opinions. I talked with my powder coat guy and he said he had no way to keep the spray off the backside so I decided to let him go at it. I did shave off a little of the center panel edges to allow for the thickness of the coating. I noticed that some did their riveting before coating and some after. I went the before route because I like the look of the heads coated.

I've always had flat black panels but decided to go with a neutral gray this time because I like the contrast of the black avionics against it. We'll see...

Bill

Me too ...

I had mine painted after the rivets were in; the color is satin-finish stone gray. I really like it.