paint it yourself, unless you have over GBP10,000 to give to someone else to
fill, sand and spray your pride and joy. probably a bit cheaper if you fill
and sand it first, but 'professional' sprayers will slap more paint on until
they get the finish they are happy with. I know of one europa that was sprayed
by aircraft (actually RAF) painters. Super finish, but each wing weighed about
15 to 20 lb extra, and in the end the builder spent many hours sanding off the
excess weight! His problem was that he didnt have a couple of RB199's pushing
his europa around....
A guy in one of the Europa club magazines (issue 9, june 96) described a paint
system used on gliders, called Schwabbellack, which is very hard wearing and
durable. I decided to use it in the end. The finish does not depend on how you
spray it on (just using a medium compressor and cheap spray gun), but on what
you sand off when flatted down with 400/600/1000 wet and dry, used wet. I am
very pleased with my initial efforts, would hate to think what sort of mess i
would have made with the standard aircraft paints.
chus, dave
kit67 and now G-BXUM
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