From: Epplin John A Subject: COZY: Finishing Date: Fri, 28 Jan 2000 07:41:30 -0600 I made a mistake by priming the cowling that I purchased from Feather Lite without first filling it as I did all the surfaces that I built. The cowling looks so good, from a mold etc that I thought the little imperfections would fill with Smooth Prime. I washed it with a high pressure washer, followed by soap and lots of water rinse. Wiped it with Polyfiber prepwipe, allowed to dry and applied 5 coats by roller of smooth prime. About a jillion pinholes appeared. It became obvious that they were not going to fill unless I used many coats of primer. I finally gave up, sanded most of the primer off and applied super fill over the entire surface, as thin as I could get it. Should have done that before. It appears that the mold release they used must have had many small bubbles in it. These turned into pinholes in the surface of the cowling. Other than that the cowl was very well done, the fit was excellent and overall appearance was very good. I don't know if this is just the state of the art or mine was unusual. I peel plyed all my layups and had very few pinholes to worry about. The cowl was near the last part I primed so I had established a practice that was working well for me up until that time. Should have paid attention to details a bit better. I mention this not to bad mouth anyone, but to save someone else the time and trouble of refinishing a part. John Epplin.. Mk4 #467 Date: Thu, 03 Feb 2000 13:47:49 -0800 From: Howard Rogers Subject: RE: COZY: Finishing tcarrico wrote: >Not to knock the sand blasting as it does sound like a good idea. > >These structures have been made like this for years, so I am pretty sure >anyone that did not sandblast is OK. As an alternative you could peel >ply areas that were a concern. If for some reason sandblasting was >impractical. > >tc I never intended to suggest that sandblasting was in any way required. Peel ply (according to Rutan) is not to be used over the whole surface(excessive weight gain), so in my book that is not an option. When I discovered how much work it was to *TOTALLY* remove every last bit of gloss in just one square foot of area, I immediately began to search for a "better way". I tried it out on my main spar first, since it had to be bonded in so many places, and of course, I hadn't thought ahead with peel ply for all of them. It takes about as much time to describe the process of setting up for this as it did to actually do it. A couple of sawhorses, a hose out the door, a home-made hood using an old pillowcase and a face shield, etc. My biggest problem was that even my dinky little sandblaster would quickly outrun my compressor's capacity, so I had to wait a bit for it catch up periodically. When I get to doing this with wings, I will spread out a lot of visquene sheet, and re-use the sand, to some extent. I know that finishing will be one of the biggest challenges to this project, because of the sheer quantity of mind-numbing, repetitive work involved. Anything I can find to reduce this factor is worthwhile to me, to at least try it. I tried the sandblasting, and I loved it. -Howard Rogers From: "John Slade" Subject: COZY: Product report - polyfiber smooth prime Date: Sun, 27 Feb 2000 19:51:37 -0500 Builders, I used Polyfiber Smoothprime for the first time today and just have to gush about it a while, so bear with me - or hit delete if you've been there, done that.... I spent two weeks preparing the top surface of the wings & strakes, the winglets, rudders, ailerons, fuselage sides, nose, gear legs and covers. I decided to mix up 1/2 a gallon to see how far it went. Six hours later I'm on my third coat and just can't get rid of the remaining paint! The stuff rolls on beautifully and covers a multitude of sins. 50 grit scratches simply disappear. (36 grit ones I can still see, but at least they now show up and are easy to fill). One dip of the roller gives enough paint to cover 1/3 of the wing surface. Many small imperfections disappeared but it was a fair trade off, these were exchanged for quite a few ridges, dips and bumps I hadn't seen - now quite visible and easy to zero in on. Don't waste you're time going down to 320 grit on the superfil and micro, just prime it and fix what's left. Regarding pinholes - I'd heard and read horror stories about pinhole chasing. I painted the wings, strakes and winglets and didn't see a pinhole. Not a one. Finally, when I got to the fuselage sides (my early work done without 4mm plastic) I saw my first set of pinholes as the paint rolled over one area. Ah - that's what they look like! I saw them for, perhaps, 15 seconds - then the smooth prime filled them up on the first coat. There were no pinholes anywhere when I did the second coat. Net result - my plane is now white. I think it looks great. All those pieces I joined together have suddenly become a "thing". I measure finish quality by how close you can get before it starts to look ugly. :) I'd put this at 10 feet - paint it with gloss and it would probably be a 20 footer right now. (I've seen some 1 footers, many 30 footers and a couple of 10'000 footers at fly-ins.) Given the theory of diminishing returns, my target is 2 to 3 feet. Not a show winner, perhaps - but not embarrassing either. Considering this is stage one of a many stage process I'm VERY pleased, as you can probably tell. I highly recommend Smooth Prime. (but then - I've never used any of its competitors). Pictures will appear on my web site in a week or two. Regards, John Slade, Cozy MKIV #757, progress: http://kgarden.com/cozy West Palm Beach, FL PS - After much experimentation and lots of wasted time effort and aluminum, I've finally discovered what, IMHO, I consider to be the perfect location for a landing / recognition light and the perfect headrest. See http://kgarden.com/cozy/mods.htm for details. From: "John Slade" Subject: COZY: Superfil weight? Date: Tue, 29 Feb 2000 19:43:01 -0500 Hi, Recently I had a lump of Superfil left over, so I rolled it into a ball and let it set. The ball seemed "heavy", so I did the same with a lump of dry micro and did a simple weight for volume experiment using displacement in a cup of water and a postal scale. Despite all Superfil's claims of lightness, I found micro to be approximately 50% lighter by volume. Margin of error was probably around 10%. Did anyone else ever do a comparison? I still like Superfil for final filling because it spreads so smoothly, but I'd always thought Superfil was lighter than dry micro. Apparently it isn't, by a long way. On a side note, following Jeff Russell's advice, I tried Cabosil (comes from Wicks in bags) for filling scratches. It does the job beautifully, much better than dry micro or even superfil, but don't (like me) try to use this stuff for anything but scratches and VERY tiny imperfections. It sets like steel. Isn't this fun! John Slade, Cozy MKIV #757, progress: http://kgarden.com/cozy West Palm Beach, FL From: alwick@juno.com Date: Tue, 29 Feb 2000 19:28:08 -0800 Subject: Re: COZY: Superfil weight? Sorry for questioning your info, but it wasn't clear from your post. You weighed it in air? You used water only to estimate volume of submerged material? If you have trapped air in either sample, it will significantly affect the results. If you compare the weight while submerged to weight in air, you are actually measuring specific gravity of the material. My impression is that superfil is considerably lighter than most micro. But I never measured it. I'd recommend two more samples. If they agree with your first results, then you must be right. Certainly does not agree with my impression and with the suppliers literature. -al On Tue, 29 Feb 2000 19:43:01 -0500 "John Slade" writes: > Margin of > error was > probably around 10%. Did anyone else ever do a comparison? > > I still like Superfil for final filling because it spreads so > smoothly, but > I'd always thought Superfil was lighter than dry micro. Apparently > it isn't, > by a long way. ________________________________________________________________ YOU'RE PAYING TOO MUCH FOR THE INTERNET! Juno now offers FREE Internet Access! Try it today - there's no risk! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/tagj. From: "John Slade" Subject: Re: COZY: Superfil weight? Date: Tue, 29 Feb 2000 23:23:14 -0500 Al, >Sorry for questioning your info Not at all. >You weighed it in air? You used water only to estimate volume of submerged >material? Correct. But I think this is a fair test. The micro and superfil were both scraped off the edge of my mud trowel. Similar stuff went on the plane in both cases. No significant air was trapped in either. They are solid lumps. I cut through them both with a hacksaw. No visible air. (The micro would have to be 33% air to account for the weight difference). >Certainly does not agree with my impression and >with the suppliers literature. My thoughts exactly. >I'd recommend two more samples. If they agree with your first results, >then you must be right. Agreed. I was hoping for a couple of independant samples from other builders. If Superfil is significantly heavier than micro, then we should be aware of this when choosing to buy and use it. I will fill a small cup with exactly equal amounts of each, then weigh both. I'm out of Superfil, so this will have to wait a while. Regards, John Slade Date: Wed, 01 Mar 2000 05:19:45 -0500 From: Jeff Russell Subject: Re: COZY: Superfil weight? John Slade wrote: > Recently I had a lump of Superfil left over, Snip > Did anyone else ever do a comparison? I did this about 8 years ago when it first came out and it was the first formulation and yellow. It was much lighter and dryer than the new stuff that is blue. I did a volume comparison. > I still like Superfil for final filling because it spreads so smoothly, but > I'd always thought Superfil was lighter than dry micro. Apparently it isn't, > by a long way. Agreed > On a side note, following Jeff Russell's advice, I tried Cabosil (comes from > Wicks in bags) for filling scratches. It does the job beautifully, much > better than dry micro or even superfil, but don't (like me) try to use this > stuff for anything but scratches and VERY tiny imperfections. It sets like > steel. John, I only use Cab-o-sil with resin to get rid of the tiny imperfections but mostly the @*$%# pinholes. Scratches should be sanded down with higher grit paper before you cab-o-sil the part. I primary fill with dry micro after prep sanding and cleaning. I mix the dry micro in large batches and spread quickly covering the part with plastic or peel ply to keep the micro laying down and not rolling up after you spread it. Neat trick. I normally use an air sander to knock a lot of the filler off first, Then I sand with a body file with 36 grit using light spray of color paint to tell me where I am in contour. I check a lot with a straight edge. When I start seeing the fiberglass showing, then I know I have taken off as much as possible. I sand to 80 grit before priming. Then I cab-o-sil to get rid of pinholes. Then roll 2-3 coats primer and block sand 80 and then spray the last 2 coats. This gives the same results with the most amount of time savings in the finishing process. I only use Superfil as a spot filler or to fill seams on a molded part. I NEVER use micro as a spot filler. The resin you mix with the micro will resin leach on your part and you will have hard spots that will not sand the same giving you hell to pay trying to get the part straight. I have learned the hard way on that when building my 3 place Cozy. The plans said to use the left over resin from your lay-ups and start filling you parts by just adding micro to the resin. You end up with a patch work quilt and it sands like having hard and soft spots..... Try it and you will see what I mean. -- Jeff Russell/AeroCad Inc. Website: http://www.Aerocad.com 2954 Curtis King Blvd. Ft. Pierce, FL. 34946 Shop# 561-460-8020 7:00am to 3:30pm Sun-n-fun booth D-73 Sponsor- Canard Aviators www.canard.com canard Aviators page Date: Wed, 01 Mar 2000 05:30:28 -0500 From: Jeff Russell Subject: Re: COZY: Superfil weight? alwick@juno.com wrote: > My impression is that superfil is considerably lighter than most micro. > But I never measured it. I have seen some people calling wet micro - dry micro. My dad always asks me how dry do you want it? I like it really dry but it is a pain to spread. BTW, slurry should be about 50% micro and 50% mixed resin by volume. I have also seen many first time builder add about a table spoon of micro to about 16 ounces of mixed resin. You wasting you time by adding so little. The the weight would be almost the same as the normal resin mix. Micro is only going to do it's job to reduce the weight if you add to correct amount for the job :-) -- Jeff From: "Hunter, Gary GA SCC" Subject: RE: COZY: Superfil weight? Date: Wed, 1 Mar 2000 06:14:05 -0600 John Slade stated - ......Despite all Superfil's claims of lightness, > I found micro to be approximately 50% lighter by volume. Margin of error > was > probably around 10%...... > I'm sorry John, I find that VERY difficult to believe. 50% lighter ??? Impossible. Sounds like a gestimate to me. Be careful. Gary Hunter Date: Wed, 01 Mar 2000 07:58:35 -0500 From: Paul Krasa Subject: Re: COZY: Superfil weight? >John, I only use Cab-o-sil with resin to get rid of the tiny >imperfections but mostly the @*$%# pinholes. Scratches should >be sanded down with higher grit paper before you cab-o-sil the >part. Like Jeff, I use Cab-o-sil and resin in toothpaste consistency to fill pin holes. If the surface is dusted with dry micro while it is still wet then the sanding process is easy. I wet sand the "cab-o-siled" surface with 220 grit and then go straight to sparying on epoxy primer. Using cab-o-sil eliminates 99% of the pin holes, but if you do not dust the surface, the time saved will be wated sanding the rock hard surface. paul long ez 214lp From: "John Slade" Subject: Re: COZY: Superfil weight? Date: Wed, 1 Mar 2000 07:04:22 -0500 Gary, > John Slade stated - ......Despite all Superfil's claims of lightness, >> I found micro to be approximately 50% lighter by volume. Margin of error >> was probably around 10%...... >I'm sorry John, I find that VERY difficult to believe. 50% lighter ??? >Impossible. Sounds like a gestimate to me. By scientific terms, Gary, it was definately a gestimate. I used a postal scale. The "lump" of micro would cost 33c to mail, the Superfil would be 57c. :) Now it's up to you guys with the fancy equipment to get the definitive data. I'll bring my "lumps" to the S&F dinner if you like. Regards, John >Be careful. always. From: "John Slade" Subject: Re: COZY: Superfil weight? Date: Wed, 1 Mar 2000 07:46:26 -0500 Hi Paul, Thanks for the tip of dusting cabosil with micro. I'll try it. Its interesting that you and Jeff both use it mainly for pinholes. Like I said in a previous post, I saw no pinholes whatsoever until I got to the fuselage which was done before I learned to use "plastic peel ply". The Smooth Prime killed those pinholes I did have in one fell swoop. I had thought that the main advantages of the plastic were reduction of air bubbles (which are, I guess, what causes the pinholes), removal of excess epoxy by compressing the layup, smoother finish and lighter results. If pinholes are such a nuisance, then that's another reason to use the plastic. By the way, I use peel ply under the plastic in areas where there will be future bonding. New builders - If you haven't tried the plastic peel ply method, I highly recommend that you experiment with it early on. IMHO you won't regret it! John Slade, Cozy MKIV #757, progress: http://kgarden.com/cozy West Palm Beach, FL From: SWrightFLY@aol.com Date: Mon, 13 Mar 2000 08:39:26 EST Subject: COZY: Fwd: [c-a] Top Gloss Warning I was at Mikes shop shortly before he discovered the following problem..... Mike applied the top coat exactly per instructions. If anyone has any bad experience with the primer please let us know. So far, the superfill and primer seems like excellent material. The top coat was applied with the recommended temp. and thickness the instructions required. << Last night a friend and I removed three weeks worth of work from my wings. While carefully trying to remove masking from "N" number and trim, I kept having "Top Gloss" lift off of the "Smooth Prime". After fighting this for several days during the various stages of masking trim, I finally gave up on "Top Gloss" and started to literally peel off huge sheets of paint. It was like pulling plastic wrap off of a smooth surface. Once a corner was lifted, a gentle pull would do the rest. We stripped both wings in less than three hours. I am not an expert painter, nor am I a novice. I have painted R/C aircraft, cars,and repairs on jet skis and EZ's All had excellent long term adhesion. Even "Krylon" works good. I have never seen any other paint behave this way. Yes, I did follow the Flight Gloss Manual to the letter, and reviewed it again to make sure I wasn't sticking my foot in my mouth before writing this. The primed surface never contacted human skin and was cleaned thoroughly with the recommended cleaners prior to top coat. At this time, I can not find fault with "SuperFil" or "Smooth Prime", although I wonder if the primer had anything to do with the top coats not sticking. FWIW Mike Bowden Two EZ MS1 N102ML From ???@??? Sat Mar 18 18:41:05 2000 Return-Path: owner-cozy_builders@betaweb.com Received: from alum.mit.edu (ALUM.MIT.EDU [18.72.0.38]) by acestes-fe0.ultra.net (8.8.8/ult/n20340/mtc.v2) with ESMTP id TAA17239 for ; Fri, 17 Mar 2000 19:54:27 -0500 (EST) Received: from twc2.betaweb.com (majordomo@betaweb.com [206.43.209.18]) by alum.mit.edu (8.9.3/8.9.2) with ESMTP id TAA07135 for ; Fri, 17 Mar 2000 19:54:27 -0500 (EST) Received: (from majordomo@localhost) by twc2.betaweb.com (8.9.3/8.9.3) id PAA27999 for cozy_builders-list; Fri, 17 Mar 2000 15:05:52 -0500 X-Authentication-Warning: twc2.betaweb.com: majordomo set sender to owner-cozy_builders@betaweb.com using -f Received: from tisch.mail.mindspring.net (tisch.mail.mindspring.net [207.69.200.157]) by twc2.betaweb.com (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id PAA27993 for ; Fri, 17 Mar 2000 15:05:45 -0500 From: cdenk@ix.netcom.com Received: from ely-oh4-46.ix.netcom.com (ely-oh4-46.ix.netcom.com [206.216.59.174]) by tisch.mail.mindspring.net (8.9.3/8.8.5) with SMTP id RAA26469 for cozy_builders@canard.com; Fri, 17 Mar 2000 17:38:41 -0500 (EST) Date: Fri, 17 Mar 2000 17:38:41 -0500 (EST) To: cozy_builders@canard.com Message-Id: <2000317173717626962@ix.netcom.com> Subject: COZY: Paint choice X-Mailer: Netcomplete v4.0, from NETCOM On-Line Communications, Inc. MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Sender: owner-cozy_builders@betaweb.com Precedence: bulk Reply-To: cdenk@ix.netcom.com X-UIDL: 52abf33c90ebe71b06f1299169c56c95 Was said My observations of Deltron, Concept current version. 1: Did the spraying in my garage attached to house, which has drywall ceiling and walls. 2: Overspray, with an suction feed air spray gun, got thick at times, making a fog in the room, but it dry falls within a foot or 2 of the surface being sprayed. Most sweeps up, very little sticks. A lot easier to paint the wood window trim, than build a spray booth, or even transport to a spray booth. 3: Although I have spray painted many times, the Deltron is easy to apply, with a few easy to do tips. Basically, have a light(illumination) at a flat angle at the other side of the spray gun, and you look at a flat angle at the surface. Literally what you see as far as orange peal, dry surface, flow out, etc. is what you have withing inches of where the spray has just left. One can vary the distance from the surface to the spray nozzle, speed, air pressure and gun settings and see instant results. The first coat should be about 50% coverage, with some of the under color showing through,it will look more like a mist not flowing out, later coats will flow out and cover. 4: Have seen the results of neophyte painters with excellent results, if any one at Sun N Fun, check out Ron Wilson's Cosy Classic, which has been in the air 5 months. 5: I don't buy the low adhesion of the Top Coat as being acceptable. That might be a good characteristic for other applications. Sounds like they should specify a bond coat. 6: One of the award winning Cozy's had a paint bond failure, I remember his wife commenting about pealing the paint off using a razor blade at OSH. Everone agreed it was hard work, that wished had not been necessary. 7: And again what I like best, excellent gloss, durability, and easy spot repair Very few coatings can claim that). Date: Sat, 18 Mar 2000 05:47:00 -0800 Subject: Re: COZY: Top Gloss Warning From: Robert E Smith Mike and other builders; I've read the notes on Top Gloss and it dawns on me what could be the problem. I'm in the painting trade. (Industrial buildings) We have had problems with men not putting enough paint on, trying to stretch the coverage or for whatever reason, and have had good paint fail because of this. Perhaps you did not put the paint on heavy enough in the first coat. Couple of thing to consider. Lacquers will melt into previous coats. If you have a couple of light coats of Lacquer, a third heavy coat will melt the previous ones into the third. You can with each coat put the product on heavier because each one bites right down to the prime coat. Not so with water based paints. The first coat of water born paint must be heavy enough to coat and bite the primer, and each following coat must also be sufficient to flow or else bond will be compromised. If the temperature is high, care must be taken to keep a wet edge. If the surface temp is high the paint may dry before it flows. This could happen with the heat lamps. The gun must be held close enough to the surface to prevent the atomized particles of paint from drying before they hit the surface. Air pressure is also critical. Not to high to blow the paint all over and dry it before it reaches the surface, but high enough to break up the paint and get an even smooth coat. These are basic things, hopefully helpful, if not applicable to this problem. Bob Smith From: "Randel's Linux Box" Subject: Re: COZY: Zolatone paints Date: Sun, 7 May 2000 07:42:58 -0700 Rob, I believe that I ordered my zolatone from Spruce. It came in one gallon cans that could then be used in a spray paint gun. Regards, Randel Livingood On Sun, 07 May 2000, R Kittler wrote: > Anyone know who sells Zolatone spray paints?. Markets or distributes? > Haven't been able to locate locally yet and could use a point in the right > direction. > > Thanks > > Rob Kittler -- "In a world without walls, who needs windows or gates?" Linux OS. Date: Sun, 07 May 2000 10:45:56 -0700 From: Richard Riley Subject: Re: COZY: Zolatone paints Zolatone 323-269-9231 3360 E Pico Blvd Los Angeles, CA At 09:32 AM 5/7/00 -0400, R Kittler wrote: >Anyone know who sells Zolatone spray paints?. Markets or distributes? >Haven't been able to locate locally yet and could use a point in the right >direction. > >Thanks > >Rob Kittler > > > Richard Riley Renaissance Composites 3025 Airport Ave Santa Monica, CA 90405 310.301.1943 www.berkut.com From: alwick@juno.com Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2000 15:02:38 -0700 Subject: COZY: Paint evaluation It's been over a year since I first started painting my plane. I used the water base paint sold by Polyfiber, called Flight Gloss. I initially did a number of cross hatch adhesion tests to make sure I didn't have problems. All locations tested just fine. Since that time I've made a number of additional evaluations. Additionally, I painted some car parts with the PPG Concept paint (traditional toxic stuff). Flight Gloss Positive observations: -I used a saber saw to remove the brake conduit from my "finished" landing gear. No paint chipping, delam, etc. -I used a hole saw on the wing painted surfaces. No paint peel, chip, delam observed at cut edges. -I removed the top coat of paint with dual action sander and repainted my strakes. No repaint problems, quick and easy. Flight Gloss Negative observations: -I spilled auto fuel on my strakes appx. 90 days after paint. I didn't wipe it off and had never waxed the paint (wax recommended). Paint developed superficial dark splotches at each drop, couldn't wash off with soap and water months later. I had never waxed it because I didn't like my poor sanding scratches due to too coarse paper. - I had small area develop small blisters under top coat shortly after paint. Unknown cause but it's conceivable that I splashed oil or some other contaminant on primer surface. Spraying Flight Gloss vs. PPG Concept: With Flight Gloss, you tend to apply too much and develop runs. But it didn't take me too long to learn the method. With PPG Concept, you tend to apply too little and develop orange peel. But it doesn't take too long to learn how. However, the too little-too much tolerance zone for Flight Gloss is a tighter zone than the same for PPG Concept. PPG is easier to paint as a result. On a scale of 1 to 10 (10 is good), guess I'd rate PPG an 8 for paintability, I'd rate Flight Gloss a 5. On the other hand, I loved the pin hole filling and non toxic Flight Gloss characteristics. Sooooooo, If I had to do it all over again, would I still use Flight Gloss? Tough call. I think I still would. But not if I experience a recurrence of the auto fuel discoloration problem. Trying to be objective here so those getting near paint point can evaluate. -al wick Canopy Latch System guy. Artificial intelligence in cockpit, Cozy IV powered by Subaru 2.5 21 items remaining to complete. Nov. 2000 first flight scheduled ________________________________________________________________ YOU'RE PAYING TOO MUCH FOR THE INTERNET! Juno now offers FREE Internet Access! Try it today - there's no risk! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/tagj. From: "D. Rothrock" Subject: Re: COZY: Paint evaluation Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 07:22:32 -0400 >Was said > >After almost 7 years and 800 hours, my Deltron (the previous version of >Concept) has no discolorations from any chemicals, fuel, etc. > My local PPG Distributor suggests DELTA DGHS, (a single stage graffiti & chemical resistant polyurethane). It covers a little better than Concept II and costs a little less. (I'll let you know the results soon) Don From: alwick@juno.com Date: Wed, 19 Jul 2000 22:09:30 -0700 Subject: Re: COZY: Paint evaluation On Wed, 19 Jul 2000 19:00:08 -0400 "John Slade" writes: > > What prep did you do? Sand primer till smooth. Primer provides all the color(can't have non-white color showing thru primer). Paint directly over primer. > Did you use smooth prime? Yes. Really liked it. I used the newer "no UV" primer they now supply. > What type of painting gun did you use? Std inexpensive gun. > Did you do the recommended color sanding after painting? Yes. It really improves your ultimate gloss. How long after? I think they say to wait a week. That seemed to work just fine. I also color sanded after 2 mo's. Seemed a little more difficult, as if paint gets a little harder after 30 days. If you are not generous enough with 1st 2 layers of top coat, then it helps to sand 2nd layer of topcoat before last coat. At that time, sand out any runs too. Runs sand out better after 2 weeks or so. You can always sand out run then give it another shot of paint. I had best luck using dual action sander for all this stuff on the topcoat. good luck. Let us know how it goes. -al wick Canopy Latch System guy. Artificial intelligence in cockpit, Cozy IV powered by Subaru 2.5 21 items remaining to complete. Nov. 2000 first flight scheduled ________________________________________________________________ YOU'RE PAYING TOO MUCH FOR THE INTERNET! Juno now offers FREE Internet Access! Try it today - there's no risk! For your FREE software, visit: http://dl.www.juno.com/get/tagj. Date: Thu, 20 Jul 2000 19:35:48 -0400 From: Carl Denk Subject: Re: COZY: Paint evaluation Was said Subject: COZY: Paint I have been a strong supporter of Deltron (Concept) paint, BUT, I am sure there are others out there that will do a fine job, and urge before using any, in particular not wide spread proven, get a small quantity of the product you are interested in, and test it for application, touch up and final appearance, and then seek to see some that have been in use for some time to ensure durability. Note that most autos have relatively small panels, like a hood or door that can be repainted as a panel, but and EZ, to touch up a stone nick on the nose, would require repainting the entire fuselage, not only much work, but adding weight. We all can see early trials of General Motors water base paints, that over the years just peal off. I certainly don't want to anyone I know to have similar problems. From: "Paul Stowitts" Subject: COZY: Zolatone report Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2000 20:11:02 -0800 Thanks to everyone for their Zolatone experiences. I wanted to pass along what I did. I ended up priming the interior with grey sandable primer from Home Depot. This took about 4 cans. Now both my wife and I spent time in the tub sanding away the threads left over from peel ply. They are a pain in the rear! I figured we had gotten most of them but priming proved me wrong - way wrong. Those little threads were everywhere and the primer showed every single one of them. Somehow, though, it also made them very easy to remove. I could literally scrap them away with my fingernail. So my advice is don't bother sanding those threads - just prime and then scrape them away. To spray the Zolatone, I purchased a pressure spray gun and cup from Harbor Freight (complete set cost $70). The nozzle opening was smaller than recommended by Zolatone but it worked great. You spray two coats. The first is at high gun pressure with the nozzle almost closed while keeping the gun close to the surface. The second coat is low gun pressure, nozzle wide open while backing the gun further away from the surface. It came out great. A few things that would have helped. Try to have someone to help (make sure they have a respirator, it's nasty smelling stuff). They can hold a light, the pressure cup or even the hoses when your in the tight spots. Spraying in the back seat area was not what I would call fun. Mask and cover EVERYTHING within 20 feet minimum. When you're shooting the splatter coat, it can go a long distance. Be sure to let the paint dry before removing the masking tape. It came off without a problem after drying. I have a few areas to touch up but I'm very happy with the results. If you purchase the Harbor Freight spray system, the manual has the cup pressure knob labeled backwards. You turn it clockwise to increase the cup pressure. Paul Stowitts Cozy Mark IV N166PT Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2000 08:45:15 -0500 From: Carl Denk Subject: Re: COZY: Zolatone report Was said Usually these class of materials are lacquer or possibly mineral spirits bsed, and do not have the adhesion strength of the 2 component, usually epoxy primers, which would be preferred. There are areas that get heavy useage on the interior, and one doesn't need finish coming off. Date: Thu, 09 Nov 2000 09:55:29 -0800 From: Richard Riley Subject: Re: COZY: Zolatone report (Attn Pumba) I've sprayed Zolatone over DuPont 131S Lacquer primer. The Zolatone flaked off. I've also sprayed it over a horrible nasty green 2 part that Stan Sussman recommended, and it worked wonderfully. It was self etching, even on epoxy, and I didn't even sand in some areas. I think it was a Z-spar product. The Zolatone 1 part primer is very good, but not as good as the 2 part. At 08:45 AM 11/5/00 -0500, Carl Denk wrote: >Was said > >Usually these class of materials are lacquer or possibly mineral spirits >bsed, and do not have the adhesion strength of the 2 component, usually >epoxy primers, which would be preferred. There are areas that get heavy >useage on the interior, and one doesn't need finish coming off. > > Richard Riley Renaissance Composites 3025 Airport Ave Santa Monica, CA 90405 310.391.1943 www.berkut.com