Best approach for repainting a just-off color

Hi folks,

I've bought a '54 L-21 last year. Two years back it had a groundloop and the left wing replaced. The Cub's color is yellow, but they didn't spray white as a base coat on the silver (poly-fiber system with aero-thane). So now the color is more like orange.. It looks really bad because flaps and ailerons weren't replaced and thus repainted ;-)

Since winter is coming I am making plans to correct this, but I am not sure how to correct this properly.. Any thoughts?

Best regards,
Bert

I would send a paint sample to Poly-Fiber and have them custom match the color. Explain to them the issue. Takes more yellow to cover. Randthane might be better since it has twice the pigment.

You're going to have to go white, then yellow to match

I have tried that. Stitts cannot match their own colors. They had Cub Yellow from 1969 through about 1990, and you could buy a can and it matched exactly. You can no longer do that.

I have also tried those fancy automotive paint stores. My Cub is 1980 Ford truck commercial yellow (a chrome yellow). I have the exact formula. I cannot get it matched.

The closest I have come to old Stitts Cub Yellow is by mixing lemon yellow and 146 yellow in my shop. Norm Douthit Aero is always helpful with my requests for a quart of this and a quart of that.

bob turner said:

I have tried that. Stitts cannot match their own colors. They had Cub Yellow from 1969 through about 1990, and you could buy a can and it matched exactly. You can no longer do that.

I have also tried those fancy automotive paint stores. My Cub is 1980 Ford truck commercial yellow (a chrome yellow). I have the exact formula. I cannot get it matched.

The closest I have come to old Stitts Cub Yellow is by mixing lemon yellow and 146 yellow in my shop. Norm Douthit Aero is always helpful with my requests for a quart of this and a quart of that.

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They will custom match a color by hand if you ask. Have to buy a gallon though. I’m about to spray dope and see how they did. The first time i sprayed the color the owner gave me it was off. By a lot.


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I agree you need to paint white first. Issue I have seen with this kind of problem, is that to get right, you will be adding quite a lot of weight and may feel it in the rigging. They may already have extra weight in trying to cover silver with yellow? Weight adds up very quickly when things go south and need a re-do.

I know it's blasphemy to suggest, but per the STC your fabric is coated with Aerothane. What's to stop you from going to the local auto paint store and getting a custom color single stage Imron or similar paint for an added top coat? Color matching is what suppliers like that do. And you'll be able to skip adding the white.

bob turner said:

I have tried that. Stitts cannot match their own colors. They had Cub Yellow from 1969 through about 1990, and you could buy a can and it matched exactly. You can no longer do that......

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I looked at an assortment of "yellow" colors available once....mind boggling how many there are.
FWIW I was told that Piper Cubs are not painted "Cub Yellow" like you might assume,
but rather "Lockhaven Yellow".
I do know a few people who picked out the yellow for their Cub but ended up with something else...
one in fact is darn near orange.
I went through the same thing recently when I had my house painted.The various reds look one color on the paint card, another color in a 2' x 2' swath on the wall,
and another color when you cover the whole house with it.
"Spanish red" seemed to be as close as I could come,
although once it was on and dry it turned out to not be what I'd hoped for.

Speak with Chris or Alex - the UK agents for Poly Fiber - they are always ready to help and answer questions. I'm pretty sure they can match colours. AIRCRAFT COVERINGS LTD Henstridge Airfield, Henstridge, Somerset, BA8 0TF, UK Tel: +44 (0) 1963 363636 Fax: +44 (0) 1963 363094 E-mail: info@aircraftcoverings.com Frank (Covered a Fairchild UC61 Argus with Poly Fiber system in Authentic Camouflage colours)

Well, I would pay real money for a gallon of pre-1990 Stitts Cub yellow.

I had a quart I got from Ray Stitts himself out of the very first batch of Poly Tone. I had already done the top coat in butyrate, so the can sat around until about six years ago, when I did some repairs on our 1993-restored J-3. Perfect match, after all those years. Now I cannot beg, steal, borrow, or buy matching Poly Tone.

Randolph is the same way, only they retained the old part numbers. The old Lock Haven yellow and the Sport yellow got reversed! And neither is a match for the Carlstadt colors. Even white took a hit. Try matching older Juneau white.

I 100% agree about white before yellow. It actually saves weight - one coat of white and two coats of yellow gives a better yellow than eight coats of yellow over silver.

Finally - J-3s came in various shades over the years. The 1946 color was Sport Yellow, but you would need a color card from the 1980s to see what that was. I think Stewarts got it close. And the original Stitts was dead-on.

all opinion.

Paint the flap and aileron with the new available color.


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My airplane is allegedly Daytona white. A repair was done several years ago and the color does not match. I just completed a repair and the color does not match. Both repair colors match the color card Daytona white as good as I could expect. It seems to me that poly fiber cannot be held responsible for how much or what color white was applied as a base coat when complaints are made that the colors do not match. IMO.

I've found two cans of paint, from the same supplier, mixed to the same formula, on the same day can differ. The only way to be certain of a match is to mix all of the cans together before painting. It's so frustrating to have a big fuselage half painted, then open the second can only to find that it doesn't match. There are so many variables that if you do get a perfect match on a patch job you should consider yourself lucky.

For yellow it really makes no difference what shade of white is underneath. If you want consistent matching white, try Insignia White.
Juneau white used to be insignia with a little black. Now they put a little burnt umber in it, giving it a hint of beige. Repair splotches then look like peed-upon bedsheets in comparison.

You might look at Stewart System, they are great at custom matching colors. There paint also covers really well and ships regular freight being water based, no hazmat.