Should
fly my plane fly in primer or should I paint it before?
Fly in primer!
I had a heavy right wing which required changing the wing incidence
and therefore the root fittings. That would have been very ugly if it had
been painted.
Craig
Berland
IV-P
N7VG
Dear
subscribers,
Talking
to some friends there is one question where I would like to get more input:
Should
fly my plane fly in primer or should I paint it before?
History:
It
was a used plane with approx. 250 hrs, 10 years old and in a bad condition
It
had cracks on the outside, screws showing through the filler, and gaps around
the gear doors of almost one inch and a door that was absolutely not working
right.
I
removed tons of filler on the outside and a large area of foam on the belly
that was not sticking to the carbon very good. I removed numerous screws in
fuselage that were turning when I turned the nut on the other side.
We
added areas of carbon to avoid cracks above the wings. I slotted all screws
that I used through the carbon before floxing them in and put one layer of
glass or carbon over every head. We rebuild the whole gear door and step area.
My
friend that was helping me has 20 years of composite experience with certified
airplanes. I can say we tried to fix everything that looked somehow suspicious
and did not take any shortcuts.
I
am almost to the point where I got everything primed and mounted to the plane
to check for interference and functionality but none of my bolts are reliable
tight. I got all my metal parts cleaned up anodized, nickel plated or primed
again. Almost everything looks like new again. I was planning to take
everything apart again and paint it. I do not want to paint it in an assembled
condition because it would drive me nuts having paint in spots where it does
not belong (sorry, I know I am difficult).
A
friend mentioned the plane should fly in primer first to fix problems easier.
What kind of problems should I expect (especially since it flew before) and
what are your thoughts about this – It would require me to disassemble,
assemble and adjust everything thoroughly, test it, disassemble for paint and
assemble again.
Thanks
for your input
Ralf
Bronnenmeier
Phone:
(419) 369 12 33
E-mail:
bronnenmeier@grobsystems.com