More Stewarts Systems experiences

Folks,
just wanted to pass along another experience I had in painting my fuselage. I’m using a two color paint scheme with sport yellow and battleship grey with black striping between the colors. Since the majority of the fuselage is yellow, I sprayed that first and let that cure for one week prior to covering and masking the yellow to shoot the grey. The black stripe was the last to be shot, covering all with the 3M masking film. I also let the grey cure for one week. Temps in Seattle area have been around 80 in summer. When I finished the painting and started to pull of the 3M masking film, to my horror I found a perfect decal transfer of the lettering on the film to the paint on my fuselage. It was only in sections, as seen in the attached picture. I tried water, then soapy water but to no avail. Can’t use any organic solvents.
Fortunately, my local NAPA store carries the 3M machine polishing compounds 06064 and 06068. I used an air driven 3M random orbital sander with cut foam pads. This worked beautifully to remove the lettering and did not dull the gloss sheen of the Stewarts paint. I followed up with Meguiars carnuba wax.

Everything that can go wrong did go wrong in my first attempt with Stewarts, much of which was from my own mistakes. This experience almost sent me over the edge, but all is good, for now.

Wendel

Wow, that sucks. Glad it worked out. Looks great.

Bill

Wow! Remind me not to use that 3M stuff when I paint mine

Did Stewart's have any comments?

Looks great I like the scheme and thanks for the info

I did something like that once with durathane... after painting i leaned tail feathers against wall in a pile and covered them with cheep plastic drop cloth, needless to say the paint was still out gassing and BONDED to each other in stack and pulled chunks of paint off to get them apart, and the plastic imprinted anywhere it touched... I was young, I learned quick....

the other time I had a vinyl stencil for big N_Numbers BOND to the durathane that was still outgassing on a 172 I had painted.. ended up stripping that section and starting over...

A picture of the masking paper and a part number would be useful for others so they don't go down the same road as you did

The following picture is the 3M film that I used. Garden variety carried in most hardware stores. 3M appears to make other masking films. If anyone knows an autobody shop that shoots water bourne polyurethane, they may have a recommendation for masking materials.

As part of a three day seminar, I show how to apply trim over Ekopoly Premium. Preferred method is to let base coat dry minimum of 24 hours before application of trim colors. We recommend a good quality 3M paper tape within 1/8" of the trim edge first. 3m Vinyl Fine Line tape is than applied over the paper tape to the edge of the trim. Masking paper is taped to the paper tape to cover the remainder of the area being masked off. I have had good luck with the inexpensive masking paper from Harbor Freight. The idea of applying the Fine Line tape last allows the fine line tape to be removed after the trim color is finished and still wet. Remove the Fine Line tape at a sharp angle away from the wet trim color. The sharp edge will than flow out, softening the edge line. If there is any bleed through, it can be carefully removed with a Q-Tip and alcohol while the trim color is still tacky. By having the fine line tape over the paper tape, you don't have to remove the masking paper to expose the edge, preventing the possibility of the masking paper touching the wet trim colors. Another way to prevent bled through is to first shoot the base coat in the trim area, followed by the trim color after it has tacked up. This way, any gaps under the tape that might cause bleed through will be the same color as base coat. Just some tips, there are lots of other ways to apply trim colors; these have worked well for me.
Marty

I seem to recall that the Stewart manual said not to drape plastic over the still gassing finish. Is that no longer in the manual?

skywagon8a said:

I seem to recall that the Stewart manual said not to drape plastic over the still gassing finish. Is that no longer in the manual?

Click to expand...

Good question ....... so I looked more specifically at the manual and could not find the reference you mentioned. Regarding masking, the manual instructs to "use a plastic coated masking paper to avoid soak through. Do not use news paper" (Section 15 page 1). The manual does show a picture of clear plastic draped over a fuselage prior to application of the masking paper. In this case, the plastic is just lightly covering the fuselage and it dosen't have any printing on it's surface. The issue with the 3M film in the above post is the same as with news paper; transfer of the printing onto the surface of the new paint. There is no way of knowing how the paint will react to the ink used so avoid printed material for any masking or draping. Using masking paper designed for autobody work is the preferred system for covering newly painted surfaces.
Marty

Never use anything with print....the ink will most likely transfer to a place you do not want it....Murphy rules and also has the last laugh!
John