Elric

Wondering if anybody might help me please. I want to prep balsa to seal it for paint. I`ve been told it can be done but don`t quite know the best way. I do not want to apply covering and I am not going to glass the surface. Any ideas or experience with this ? Thanks guys. :drowning:

MinnFlyer

My Feedback: (4)

The method I'm familiar with is to give the surface a coat of dope, let dry, sand. Repeat. Next, add talc, cornstarch, or microballons to the dope to thicken it, and repeat until the desired surface is achieved.

djlyon

Minn's way is really the only way. Use industrial talc. The perfumed stuff doesn't work well.

Elric

Thanks Minn, I`ll try that.

Elric

dany_maia

Hi.
Try applying the same product that they give in real cars painting, that is an acrylic primmer, is brown/yellow and it is applyied with a compressor and a 0.5mm pistol. Then sand, sand, sand with 1000 and 1200 wet sandpaper, allways with water until you obtain a perfect shinning surface, with balsa sealed.
At last is the acrylic paint as the cars paint.

You can see my work with exactly this method in:
www.pbase.com/danielmaia

PaulSwany

My Feedback: (45)

Wow Dany... You sure do nice work... That cesna is a work of art.... How's if fly?

dany_maia

I have not flown it yet but I hope it flies nicely. It took a lot of work to build it and finished like it is but I think it worth the effort.
Thanks for your oppinion.
Daniel Maia

foxflyer

What about the structural qualities of a covering? I mean, doesn't the covering significantly strengthen the airframe? especially control surfaces and wings, elevator and stab?

I am building a Kougar that I want to paint. I guess I believe that I can do more with paint than I can with monokote, especially details. I did a military scheme on another bashed kit and the letters came off after a little fuel soaking from the exhaust. I didn't like that.

I was thinking using a fabric and doping it or priming it or using glass. What are the weight/strenght trade offs? It sure would be easier to sand the fully sheeted structure smooth, prime it and paint it.

Walter D

My Feedback: (16)

Danny's work is an absolute "work of art". I can see that he has done his homework impressively, to say the least, the airplane looks fantastic. In the beginning of my modeling days I finished a couple of airplanes, also by using fillers to fill the grain of the wood, and did achieve a good finish, but it required a lot of work, sanding was never finished, the problem most people will have by using this type of direct on the wood finish is that you can go overboard, and weaken the structure without realizing it, specially in areas like the wings, where a starved horse look is eminent if not careful, and the other problem is that the finish is very prone to dings and holes, as time goes by, cracks start to appear, wood is forever alive, expanding and contracting and this will show through the finish as cracks, areas that will show this first are areas that are stressed in flight, like stabilizers and wings where these parts just exit the fuselage.
Once one learns to use fiberglass and epoxy resin, covering with polyester materials and dope, silkspan and dope is an excellent way to finish fully sheeted models very easily, I have given Ozcover a test and painted it, it produced a nice finish also, what I am getting at is that there are many ways of finishing a model airplane, but the use of some type of covering to seal the wood is a better approach than doing it without them, beginners specially should remember that film covering adds a lot of strength to a model, which is going to be taking a lot of beating durign that learning stage.

HGU 34

In my experience, using something like silkspan over the balsa will make filling much easier, faster and lighter than trying to fill the grain of the balsa itself.

I have also seen a person airbrush monokote with regular enamal paints and then apply a clear fuel proof sealer over the top. Looks very nice and is a very quick method of finsih that I may have to try sometime, although I am not sure how well it holds up over time, particulary given that monokote is not what you would call dimensionally stable.

Dzlstunter

Here's something I have done, and it seems to work. 1) tear, don't cut, the edges of the silkspan where there will be a seam on the plane; 2) dampen span in towel; 3) use a very thinned-down Titebond II solution--about like skim milk; 3) brush a light coat on the wood and immediately work on the span with your brush, fingers and a little more solution; 4) when dry, stick down anything that came up with more thin solution (Titebond is HEAVY); 5) use a just-brushable mix of spackling compound and water to paint the fuse (a Tom Dixon technique); 6) sand off almost all of step 5 finishing with 240 paper used dry; 7) prime with a can of sandable primer from Autozone or someplace; 8) sand almost all of this off, finishing with 400, but leave enough for the paint to adhere to. Good luck, Dzl