As an aside to this thread, I now have the leading edges covered with the Therm-X de-icing system's silver foil and maybe have lost 3 - 5 knots in the flight levels.  The tape wraps around the edges and covers about five inches up the wing beyond the center of the leading edge and is filled in and clear coated aft of the foil surface's edge. For more precise data on this, Mark, Dave and Justin at RDD Entertpises in Redmond are the go-to guys.

 

On 10/23/07, Colyn Case on earthlink <colyncase@earthlink.net > wrote:

Fred said,

I recall querying the 3M rep at OSH about this.  His answer: take some clear finish paint and with a fine brush and a lot of patience, fill in the step behind the tape.  He said it flows and fills nicely.  

 

Fred, I don't see how that can possibly work.    It's the shape of the curve you have to manage, not just how smooth it is, right?  The edge of 1" tape would fall right in the region of the airfoil where the curve is changing very quickly.   I can imagine if you continued the tape to a relatively flat part of the airfoil, it might work.  but then you would need 3' wide tape or more.