I bought a Funtana 125 cowl as a replacement for the old cowl on my Funtanna 100X.
The new cowl is orange/red color and the paint needs to be removed and the cowl repainted all white. I am not sure what type of paint H9 uses for painting their cowls, so I figured on removing the paint on the cowl, instead of just sanding it to rough up the finish and painting the white. The white wouldn't cover the red/orange anyway.
What method would you suggest for removing the paint?
I plan on repainting with Rustolium rattle can.

Thanks in advance,
Greg

sand paper

Yup

Do you think the cowl will need any primer before painting it?

Greg

Yes, you always must prime bare fiberglass parts
I used Rustoleme sandable Auto body Primer


If I were doing this, I would First try painting without a complete strip.

sand the cowl to the point all the paint lines were blended, try 220 paper, then hit very light coats of the Primer, it's Lacquer based so it can pull enamals and Polyu paints, but if you build it up with light coats your golden to add the white rattle can paint. Worth a try before you do all the work of completely sanding off the paint,,

good luck

If your plane is a glow fuel plane I would suggest using Topflite Lustrecote. It is fuel proof and comes in white. Many people use Rustoleum with mixed results.

For prep, why go through the hassle of removing all the old paint?

I think I am going to go with the advice of scale only 4 me.
I dislike any painting with a passion and want to get this done as easily as possible.
Did I say that I hated painting?

Greg

The easy way is to use acetone to remove the old paint. If it's anything less tough than epoxy, it will wipe away pretty easily. Just wear latex gloves while you work unless you want to spend a lot of time and more acetone getting paint off your hands. If the acetone won't dissolve it, you have no worries at all with spraying the new primer over it.

As for worrying about making it fuel proof, it's not a concern for a cowl. I did a glow Cub cowl in yellow Rustoleum and Rustoleum enamel primer (definitely not fuel proof) and it hasn't had a drop of fuel touch it. Still looks good after a year. Unless you're really sloppy with fueling your engine, your cowl just isn't going to get any fuel on it.

Scale has the best advise here. I would follow his instructions except I don't see the need for primer. And the original paint enough to provide a good base to paint over, feather the lines between colors. Rustolium epoxy appliance paint is a great match for Ultracote white and if left for a week prior to exposing to fuel is quite fuel resistant. It covers really well so no need to worry about getting the darker colors covered. For even better spray quality, run hot tap water over the can for about 10 min. Apply 3 light coats 5 min apart, wait 15 min and then a medium wet coat.

Speedracerntrixie... Good tip on the Rustolium appliance paint. I was wondering how close the white would be to Ultracote white.
Jester...Good point on the acetone test to see if it will dissolve the paint that is on the cowl. It may be easier than sanding.

Greg

The need for primer
1-minimizes how much paint you need to cover on your finish coat, white will cover over solid primer grey easier than red or other combination of colors
2- It's Lacquer based, so just about any paint will go over it,, where as some paints might pull the existing paint off

Acetone??
IMO, not worth the mess, smell and cost of the acetone,, and will take just as long as sanding alone. Besides you'll have to sand and prime before you paint the white anyway, all you're saving is the micro amount of weight of the existing coat of paint/primer

good luck

Scale, the Rustoleum Appliance white is a very high solids paint and will cover the red just fine. Lacquer is a poor choice for glow powered models as it will not withstand exposure to glow fuel at all. The cowl has already been prepped for paint at the factory simply doing a scuff and spray will yeild the best results in this case. Primer is great for when you need to fill imperfections and pin holes but there should be none of that in this case.

I've done this using the method outlined above with good results. I built a custom cowl for my Cub with a detailed dummy engine. I painted over the gel coat with auto primer and rustoleum, but then I found some flaws in the surface that I wanted to fix. So 5 minutes with acetone and paper towels took it all back off to the gel coat. I figure it would have taken at least an hour to get it clean with sandpaper. The acetone cost about a dollar, so it's not exactly a big investment to make.

There's more than one way to skin a cat,, I'm just say what I would do,,These are methods that have worked well for me,, your results may vary

good luck OP

p.s.
I never suggested using Lacquer paint for a finish coat,, OP said he wants to use Rustoleum Rattle can white

This is what I did on my Hanger-9 35% Extra 260 cowling.
Before sanding, After sanding,and after paint. As already stated, there is no good reason to take off all the paint, it serves as a good base under your new finish, I did dust a light coat of primer and re-sanded prior to my topcoat application.

Bob

I finally got a chance last night to test the paint with acetone.
The acetone did nothing to the paint on the cowl, so I'm just going to scuff the paint up and repaint it.
Too many unfinished projects from last year.

Greg

I'm repairing a few nicks on an ARF cowl. After filling the nicks, I scuffed up the painted cowl with 320 grit and primed it with Duplicolor high build sandable primer.

It is now ready for most any type of paint that I want to apply.