I have not hung the engine yet, so this is advance thinking. What prep work did you folks who have painted your -12 do to the cowling? It is a very nice smooth surface that I suspect needs something to provide a tooth for the paint. Did you sand it? If not, what? thanks for your input.
Van's Air Force
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Painting the RV-12
- Thread starter JohnF
- Start date
Oh ya !
You'll need to sand on it some. Use fine paper. You will then find it has about a billion tiny pin holes that you will need to deal with. Fillers are available to fill them. You just have to do it. When you prime it, any holes you miss are right there looking at you .
John Bender
You'll need to sand on it some. Use fine paper. You will then find it has about a billion tiny pin holes that you will need to deal with. Fillers are available to fill them. You just have to do it. When you prime it, any holes you miss are right there looking at you .
John Bender
From the 'repeat offender' corner of the shop (the RV-12 being my third RV, with a flying -7A and -10 completed before) there is a nice recipe for filling the micro pinholes in the fiberglass components that come with Van's kits. It involves two steps.
Step 1. Mix West Systems epoxy 1:1 with acetone and brush it on the fiberglass surface. Use a single edge razor blade to squeegee it into the zillion holes (per square meter ;-) )that become evident. Let dry. Sand lightly.
Step 2. Get a quart of UV Smoothprime ( http://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/cmpages/09-28290.php ) and apply it with a sponge roller (yes, a roller). Sand off the excess, and if necessary repeat a second time. Can wet sand with 220 grit paper to a wonderfully smooth surface (that still has tooth for paint adhesion).
Gives a UV protected fiberglass surface that looks great when a polyurethane top coat is applied.
-Dan Masys
RV-7A N747DL - sold
RV-10 N104LD flying
RV-12 N122LD a building
Step 1. Mix West Systems epoxy 1:1 with acetone and brush it on the fiberglass surface. Use a single edge razor blade to squeegee it into the zillion holes (per square meter ;-) )that become evident. Let dry. Sand lightly.
Step 2. Get a quart of UV Smoothprime ( http://www.aircraftspruce.com/catalog/cmpages/09-28290.php ) and apply it with a sponge roller (yes, a roller). Sand off the excess, and if necessary repeat a second time. Can wet sand with 220 grit paper to a wonderfully smooth surface (that still has tooth for paint adhesion).
Gives a UV protected fiberglass surface that looks great when a polyurethane top coat is applied.
-Dan Masys
RV-7A N747DL - sold
RV-10 N104LD flying
RV-12 N122LD a building
Kyle Boatright
Well Known Member
Yes, a quart would do it assuming you followed the directions from the earlier post and squeegied epoxy into most of the holes before moving to the smoothprime.
One thing about smoothprime - unless ambient conditions are warm and humidity is low, you should need to allow significantly more time than advertised before recoating or sanding. Otherwise, you're at risk of having tiny bubbles form in or between coats.
That said, UV Smoothprime is a very good product.
And for the builder who was asking about paint quantitiy, that depends on several factors. A good painter can easily paint an RV sized airplane with 3 gallons, particularly if he's using HVLP equipment and is spraying a color that doesn't tend to be transparent. Someone who wastes a little paint, uses a conventional gun, sands between coats, or chooses a transparent color (e.g. yellow) could use a couple gallons more.
