I just started covering the new plane and started with the easy part, the wing. People have asked about covering hinge gaps and there are a lot of ways to do it. In my case i like to cover the wing and ailerons with one piece of covering and close up the hinge gaps all at the same time. It's really easy and clean up at the end of the day is a snap. First I only use Ultracote for my main covering. If I can find it I like to use mono or cheap econocote for my trim colors, using windex/ammonia to lay down the trim is a lot easier and it doesn't work with Ultra. I couldn't find any yesterday so I am stuck with the Ultra black for my trim. Not a big deal but for someone just learning to cover using mono trim is a lot easier.
First thing you need to do is put on some of your main color for what I call fillets. This way there will never be an open wood spot for oil to get into and soak the wood. I have the fillets on both the TE sides and the aileron sides then I glued in the hinges and got the ailerons on the wing. Covering the wing is easy, just don't cover the ailerons yet. When the wing and TE are covered I cut the covering at the sides of the ailerons then iron the covering onto the wing TE then the tapered side of the aileron LE while holding the aileron down to it's total deflection. After that I just draw the iron down from the aileron LE towards the TE. From then on it's just trim the covering and finish ironing the over lap covering down. With the wing flipped over you can see the covering along the hinge gap. Bottom of the wing is complete and you just do the other side.
I work my wrinkles towards the center of the wing, Ultra shrinks so well I just do it with my iron. Wrinkles just sort of flow right off the wing like magic.
Slots and/or holes I open with a small soldering iron. It melts the covering and irons it down onto the wood.
This is just another way to do the hinge gaps and it's really very easy. I do both sides. I have been asked if it helps to do away with flutter, beats me, I really haven't ever had a flutter problem. It is just how I do it and it makes my clean up easier without any gaps.

I have always sealed the hinge gaps using a strip of ultracoat before laying down the base colour, as per RCKen's LT40 thread. Seeing how you have done it indicates that that is just an unecessary extra step.

Really nice work.

The last plane I covered has large areas of ultracoat over ultracoat - really tricky to laydown nicely. I will have a go at the monocoat trim over ultracoat next time. Do you fully shrink the base layer before adding the monocoat trim? Then just a low heat to activate the trim glue or does the windex activate the glue enough?

Andrew

After I have the complete base coat on the plane I take the plane out in the sun and leave it for about an hour. It will shrink and sag. Then I take it back into the shop and tighten it up again. I do this sometimes several times until the covering no longer sags, I just call it curing the covering. Then I start adding the trim colors. I also juice up the windex with a bit more ammonia. Fact is it's the ammonia that actavates the monos backing so it can be done with just water and ammonia. After getting all the air bubbles out of the covering with a card I let it sit over night, sometimes longer, then I just use a trim iron around about 1/4 inch of the outside of the trim.
Because of the heat we get here the curing is the trick. My planes can sit out in the hot sun for days without the covering getting nasty looking.
What I learned yesterday, the black Ultra goes on at a lower temp then the yellow. I have always used the Mono black for patching and trim so it was a bit os a surprise to me. I tend to run my iron on the hot side anyway. I have also used the trick Ken used in his instruction video. There is no right or wrong way to cover, you do what works best for you. Not all planes lend themselves to the way I do things so I really have no set rule how to cover. This is just a way I have done it a lot so I'm used to it, may not be easy for others but it works for me.

I've done it both ways myself. In the LT-40 build thread I showed using a seperate piece of covering to cover the gap because it's usually a little bit easier for less experienced people to do than trying to do it with one piece of covering for the entire wing and control surface such as an aileron. I myself have covered many planes where I do it all in one piece, but it's not something that you're likely to get right the first time. That's why I didn't mention that method in the build thread, as it's targeted towards beginners in building and covering.

Either method works well and it's more of a personal choice on how you want to do it.

Ken

I only showed this way to do it because when I have mentioned one piece covering and got a lot of questions about it, this is something I wouldn't do for my first covering job, I started out doing it like Ken showed. If you give it a try and mess it up you can cut it off at the trailing edge if you have ironed on the fillet completely across from end to end instead of just the little patches I use/showed. I had covered several planes before I started doing it this way. When I am teaching kit building and covering I don't teach this method to new students. I teach students to cover the control surfaces then glue the hinges in. After the plane is covered I will cut a strip and cover the gap{{IF NEEDED}} Covering the hinge gap isn't a must do thing for every plane or every pilot, I wouldn't think of doing it with a trainer and I almost never do it to planes like the 4*, the planes don't require it.
I almost never cover the gap on the rudder either. This plane is a Bridi Dirty Birdy pattern plane, 60 size, I have already covered the rudder and it will have a gap. I have zero artistic talent and want to try a paint splatter job for the first time so I don't have a lot of high hopes for the finished product but I will give it my all. I have been looking at how others have done the splatter job to get ideas, some I like and some I don't but the idea is there floating around in my head. I never know what the finished covering job is going to look like unless it's a scale of something. This one will be a surprise to me too!!

{akamaiimageforum}/upfiles/53105/Ni22817.jpg did you use one of those tiny trim irons to get in the gap? very nice thanks for that

No but I used to use one with the flat shoe until that dumbass that is married to my wife dropped it off the bench and broke the shoe and can't get a replacement. I just haven't gotten a new trim iron yet. In this case there was a big enough taper on the aileron LE to get my normal iron into the gap far enough to do a good job. I also used hinge pins so you will always see the little bumps. The back or heel of the irons is also hotter then the rest of the iron so I slide that along the gap. After you have done it a few times you will find out where the magic spot of your iron is. My old iron burnt out and this one was my spare so this is the third plane I have covered with it, we are just making friends now and getting to know each other. I haven't even tried my new back up iron but due to the different heat range of the black and yellow I may have two irons going at the same time. The black goes on at a lot lower temp. Before the accident with my trim iron I used it almost as much as my main iron so they are well worth having.

Gray Beard,
 Sounds like the same guy handled my trim iron in the past as well!!!!! I know the misery of breaking that small shoe on the trim iron, did the same myself as well. My solution?? I bought another trim iron, but now I've taken steps to ensure I'm never in the same boat again. When you go to swap meets keep an eye out for those "junk boxes" that are on a lot of tables. Did around in them and it's possible you'll find that small shoe. At one swap meet I came up with 4 of them, and for a total of $1.25 I now have 4 spares if I ever break one again!!!

Ken

I have three bottles of Pacer hinge glue!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Last swap meet I went to I dug into every box I could find, nothing there. I did find a new iron at a good price but I also found one of those way cool covering cutters for the same price. It was a hard choice but I get to try out my trim cutter pretty soon!!! I really should have bought both, my old trim iron is held together with hose clamps, like I don't run my hand on those and the end still wobbles. I will be keeping my eyes open for those shoes, thanks for the reminder. I may hit the LHS today and go dig through his junk bins. Last week when I was there the owner was going through some of his old stuff. Huge spinners of every different size and shape, he was going to take them to the scrap place. I got a brand new 3.5 inch Tru Turn for $5.00. Too bad I sanded the nose of this plane some more before I started covering. I guess a little over size doesn't mater!!