I spent 29 years in the boat trade, and have more than a little experience with
painting / gelcoat in a far more harsh environment than most aircraft will ever
see.
A gelcoat finnish will allways be heavier than a properly executed expancell /
eurathane paint finnish, the gel is a very dense material.
The adhesion of the polyester gel to the epoxy skins is weaker than staying with
epoxy all the way through, this can be proven easilly by making test samples
for both systems, and bending them until one of them parts, it will be the gel
that comes off first every time.
Most gel coats have enough UV barrier to keep the pigments in the gel from
fading
[ this is also true of cheaper eurathanes ], they do not protect the substrate.
Back in 1976, I painted a test piece with International Paints Perfection 709,[
the leading yacht eurathane at the time ] and mounted it on a south facing
slopeing
roof. It was still there last year when I visited my old colleages, still
looks as good now as the day I put it up there ! That is 26 years ago ! Gelcoats
will need constant pollishing to keep them shiny.
The newer family of 2 pack eurathanes are even better in this respect, exept for
the water reduced types which do not have the same performance as the good ''old
cyanide'' types.
Precautions must be taken when spraying the cyanide types, a full overall and an
air fed mask, not a big deal, go with the eurathane.
Methinks someone is touting for work ?
Happy building / painting !
Nev.
>>> Gerry Holland <gnh@ddsc.demon.co.uk> 10/19/02 10:14pm >>>
"In 30 years all painted Europas will be on their 6th respray
and will need 120 HP to get airborne."
In the light of Gary McKirdy's prediction as quoted above. How many of
the pioneering Europas built and painted since 199* have had multiple
resprays or had engines uprated in preparation of the inevitable weight
increase due to yet another respray!
For those of us who have opted for Paint not Gel-coat I guess we are
running a very expensive aircraft. I'm having enough trouble selecting
my first engine let alone my second to cope with weight increase.
May be a Europa twin? [musing].
Regards
Gerry Holland
EuropaTrigear 384
G-FIZY
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