Painting an airplane

[MadDocker]

Hey Owen,

Are you interested in painting a plane at all? My brother in law is building an RV6 and wants to get it painted. Will probably need to be painted in stages (wings & tail, fairings, fuselage or something like that) so he can get it to you and back to a hanger.

Plane is like this and probably after a paint job something loosely similar to this but different colors.
http://www.unicopter.com/RV6A_Airplane.jpg

If it's something you would look at doing I'll put him in contact so you can sort out the details with him.

Cheers.

[Joe]

No offence to anyone, but don't aircraft painters have to be CASA approved?

[MadDocker]

Apparently not because of the style of plane and it being a home build. If you build over 80% of the plane yourself the requirements are different apparently.

[Buckets]

Kit built stuff is a bit different Joe, although I'm not sure that an aircraft needs an AME or LAME for a paint job. Simon (the Honda nut will know more)

[urabus]

paint it matt black for more stealth....

Brendon

[-Luke-]

http://thumbs1.ebaystatic.com/d/l225/m/mosC-EItRFtzAkZjczQFyYg.jpg

well it is a kit plane??

[uzx83]

plastidip

[Phyber]

Slightly OT but have been told by a bloke in the aviation game a paint job for a nice private jet is in the ballpark of $250,000. Just about fell over! Then he pointed out the speeds and conditions it is exposed to and it made sense. Don't want bits peeling off mid flight hahaha.

[GhostFc3s]

Also the normal smash repariers workshop's liability wouldnt normally extend to aircraft.

[Evman]

I've done quite a few planes (aircraft engineer by trade). Several things. The metal needs to be acid washed then gone over with Alodine for corrosion protection (there are standards to be met for GA, I suggest he follows them even though it's going to be Experimental), but be warned, if done wrong the Alodine can cause huge problems, so be careful. Use only high quality zinc chromate primer. Use only top quality paint (we used to use Glasurit but any top end paint will do). It's expensive, even for white, but it pays off in the long run. He will get away with the wings being done separately (by the looks of that scheme at least) but he'll want the vertical fin and rudder on the fuselage when masking the lines at least. Some painters like to mask the coloured sections off so they don't double up on paint (ie colour over white). Fuck that. Just paint the whole plane white then mask the lines over that. The additional protection outweighs the weight disadvantages (being an RV it'll be a difference of a few kg of paint at most). If the plane is kept outside or flown over the coast a lot (which being in Jandakot he will be over the coat a lot) tell him to expect to repaint it in 10 years time. If Vans is still using good aluminium he shouldn't need to, but worst case scenario he should have the money set aside just in case. With modern paint it'll be corrosion levels that will the deciding factor on whether or not it needs a respray in 10 years, not paint condition. If they're using shit ally (doubt it, but possible) he'll need to be onto the corrosion ASAP to prevent cost blowouts with panel repairs and ugly patches. Being an aerobatic plane that has a monocoque fuselage excess corrosion leads to excess ally removal during repairs which leads to a weakened airframe which is bad news for high-g manoeuvres.

Also, he should prime every inside panel he can get to (fuselage, wings, etc). No need to paint over the top, but primer will go a long way to protecting the insides.

When it comes to doing the rego he'll need to follow the regs which stipulate minimum sizing of the font. He'll also want these to be painted on (we used to get negatives done as a sticker, then paint the gaps). Stickers won't cut it in the long run, especially at the 150+knots he'll be doing in it.

Lastly, I personally love RVs but definitely prefer the tail-draggers over tricycle.

[Simon]

Kit built stuff is a bit different Joe, although I'm not sure that an aircraft needs an AME or LAME for a paint job. Simon (the Honda nut will know more)

Owen can paint the plane as long as (I'm sure he does) have the appropriate equipment and procedures for using said paint.

Corrosion prevention is primarily the responsibility of the LAME whom is undertaking the sheet metal work on the aircraft.
An RV6 kit plane is registerable under CASA hence all work, airframe / engine / avionics must be certified by a LAME with equivalent licenses.