Fabric Fix: Fact or Fantasy?
- Thread starter Rob58
- Start date
twheel47
New member
True, you can cover fabric with fabric but be very, very sure all grease and muck is completely gone. If I were doing it for someone I'd probably to the "dry strip" method to get back to silver, or bare cloth. I also think I'd go around the bottom longerons and up each side an inch or two (remember the previous tape will be gone from the dry stripping) and then use a 4" centered tape over the seam to regain the required surface tape.
I just know others will pick that apart......
I just know others will pick that apart......
jeffw
New member
twheel47 said:
My '46 14-13-2 was covered with Ceconite during its restoration in the early 70's, finally painted in 1974. It was painted with Alumigrip because, as the restorer told me, his paint shop recommended it at the time because "new Citabrias being built were all being painted coming out of the factory with Alumigrip". At that time they apparently did not have the additives that provided more flexibility in the paint. From 20 feet away the paint is still very good looking, if you don't scrutinize.
Always hangared but, the paint is at least 42 years old and has recently started to crack more around stress area, primarily on the fuselage where the fabric goes around tight bends, the 90 degree bends at the tubular structural fuselage frame, the side wood longerons in certain areas as on the side of the fuselage between the cabin front side windows and the rear windows. The belly is pretty clear of stress cracks except at the outside bottom edges of the length-wise fuselage tubular structure.
The paint will pretty much peel right of at the cracking areas until the peel gets to an area where it is adhering better.
Are there specific ways to 'encourage' dry peeling of cracking - old Alumigrip? Or, is there a document that describes 'dry peeling', or is is a talent that only some folk's possess?
Is it simply a matter of carefully stripping it all off with a putty knive like peeling skin from a bad sunburn?
twheel47
New member
Tom Witmer (Witmer's Aircraft in Reading, PA) showed me how to do it and at the time he had a VHS tape of his shop stripping a complete Viking in less than 2 work days. It took about four days when my wife and I did our Cruisair. It really is a matter of going slowly and encouraging the paint bond to fail. The first step use is the most fun when you pull off all the tapes at as close to a 90 degree angle as possible; that's the bonds weakest axis. The tape thing will remove huge swaths of paint, not just the width of the tape, and also provide lots of great failure points to help with the rest. Jim & Dondi Miller at Aircraft Technical Support in Orient,OH are quite familiar with this and might have even written out a procedure for it.
I think you have a problem with the fact that your aircraft has Alumagrip on it. When yours was painted the covering STCs only specified up to the aluminum UV layer (silver) and many people used a lot of different fancy automotive paints- almost all of which have demonstrated those finishes inability to withstand repetitive vibration. About 10 years (?) ago the STCs were changed (at the manufacturer's request) to INCLUDE the color coats because they were taking heat for the failed finishes. It will be pretty darned hard to blend anything into the existing Alumagrip.
I think you have a problem with the fact that your aircraft has Alumagrip on it. When yours was painted the covering STCs only specified up to the aluminum UV layer (silver) and many people used a lot of different fancy automotive paints- almost all of which have demonstrated those finishes inability to withstand repetitive vibration. About 10 years (?) ago the STCs were changed (at the manufacturer's request) to INCLUDE the color coats because they were taking heat for the failed finishes. It will be pretty darned hard to blend anything into the existing Alumagrip.
