Rattle Can Painting of Fiberglass Parts

[builderflyer]

Wes,

I just finished repainting the fiberglass parts on my Sonex with Dupli-color cherry red (rattle can, acrylic enamel). Not perfect but I'm satisfied with it.

Art,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,Sonex taildragger #95,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,Jabiru 3300 #261

[andrewp]

Man, that is some good rattle can!! Well done sir ...

[woodmw]

Art...

You are an artist. Well done.

[Bryan Cotton]

Very nice Art!

[WesRagle]

Dang it Art! That's beautiful. Now I feel like such a cop out. Such a failure. Those pants look awesome too. Great job eliminating the fairings.

Details? Did you buff it? Clear coat?

Wes

P.S. Andrew, good to see you posting. We miss you :-( Check your P.M.

[builderflyer]

Wes,

No clear coat. I'm really not much of a painter so I spray numerous coats and then, where needed, attack it with a 1000 grit wet sand followed rubbing compound, polishing compound, and finally, carnuba wax. There are still some areas that could use more buffing. I'm sure a real painter is cringing about now.

Art

[WesRagle]

Ok Guys,

Prodded on by Art's success I decided to give Dupli-Color a shot. I bought the paint before Art said that he used acrylic enamel. The paint I tried was called Dupli Color Perfect Match Premium Automotive Paint.

I started with a tail tip and added rivets to simulate what I would have to paint.


I sanded with 220 grit and filled the rivet countersinks with fairing filler. Then sanded again with 220 grit.



Applied three coats of Dupli-Color Scratch Filler Primer (10 min between coats per instructions).


After an hour I sanded the primer with 800 grit, wiped with a dry cloth followed by a tack <sp> cloth and applied 5 coats of top coat


I allowed the top coat to harden over night. This morning I compounded, polished, and waxed.
The surface was a bit softer than the two part paint I used. Seemed it would burn through easier if I were careless, but plenty hard to take a shine.


I had to break for a few hours for ground keeper duties. Then I gave the part the thumb nail test.


So, everything went fine except the paint didn't bond to the scratch filler primer. As an aside, I sanded a spot on the other side of the tip, wiped it down with prepsol <sp> and sprayed some "top coat" on it and it passed the thumb nail test. So the paint bonded to gel-coat just fine. I don't know, maybe the primer didn't bond to the gel-coat. I'll investigate that tomorrow.

Thoughts? Advice? Trying to plot my next move.

Wes (still cain't paint nothin') Ragle

[woodmw]

Wes,

I painted a number of parts on my Mooney using Duplicolor etching primer and PPG Concept. I know. Shouldn't have worked. Urethane over rattle can. It was on there for years and they new owner remarked that it was difficult to stripe when he repainted the plane. Three big differences between what I did and your recent try. I painted aluminum, not fiberglass. Etch primer vs high build. I never color coated in less than 5-6 days after spraying primer. So primer had plenty of time to cure. I did try some high build primer once with less than good results but don't remember all the details.

[WesRagle]

Hey Mike,

I scraped some of the paint off and put the chips under a magnifying glass. The back of the chips were gray. So, either I didn't let the primer set up long enough (though I did follow instructions) or the primer isn't compatible with gel-coat. I sprayed some more primer and will let it set a few days and give it another try.

Thanks,

Wes

[WesRagle]

HI guys,

Still trying to figure out paint.

I tried applying the Duplicolor primer, wait a couple of days, sand, clean, and apply the laquer ("Premium Car Paint" ), waited a couple of days and got the same results.



As part of my experimentation I also picked up some self etching primer from Rustoleum and Duplicolor to try those on the odd metal parts I will need to paint. I have used Mar Hyde rattle can in the past with good results except for runs. The pigment in Mar Hyde is the same color as aluminum so coverage is hard to judge. So, I am looking for an alternative.

Both Rustoleum and Duplicolor use a green pigment and are easy to judge coverage. The Rustoleum didn't work at all. The stuff is still gummy after being on for 10 days or so. Will easily scrape off with a thumb nail. Not all the way to aluminum. Just like scraping off gummy yuck.



The Duplicolor self etching primer is a possible bright spot. The following pic is primer with Duplicolor laquer top coat. One spot was sanded before top coat and one spot was not. Also shown is a block of bare primer. After the laquer was applied and allowed to dry for a day, with some effort, I could scrape down to bare metal with my thumb nail. However, I couldn't scratch the bare primer off at all.



At this point I'm thinking laquer is not good for my application/needs. Anyway, the Dupli-Color Scratch Filler Primer is going in the trash. The Dupli-Color "Premium Automotive Paint (laquer)" is going in the trash. The Rust-Oleum self etching primer is going in the trash.

I have primed another spot of aluminum and spot of stainless steal with Dupli-Color self etching priner. I will top coat with Rust-Oleum enamel tomorrow just to see how that works.

To Be Continued,

Wes